Wet Bulb Temperatures

What are Wet Bulb Temperatures?

Wet bulb temperature measures the combined effect of heat and humidity, representing the lowest temperature achievable by evaporating water into the air. It is measured using a thermometer with a water-soaked cloth over its bulb, and it always reads lower than or equal to the dry bulb temperature. A higher wet bulb temperature indicates higher humidity, which hinders evaporation and reduces the body's ability to cool itself through sweating. This makes it a critical metric for assessing heat stress on humans and is often higher than the commonly reported heat index.

Why Wet Bulb Temperatures are important

  • Humidity and Evaporation: 
    The wet bulb temperature is essentially a measure of how well water can evaporate into the air.
  • Human Cooling: Our bodies cool through the evaporation of sweat. High wet bulb temperatures mean less evaporation, making it harder to cool down and leading to dangerous heat stress. 
  • Heat Stress Threshold: 
    The wet bulb temperature is considered a more direct indicator of the risk of fatal heat stress because it reflects how effectively our bodies can shed heat. A human survival limit is often cited around a 35°C (95°F) wet bulb temperature.
  • Applications: This metric is important for HVAC systems and in public health warnings about extreme heat, as it provides a more complete picture of heat danger than air temperature alone. 
Heatwave deaths are beginning to overtake deaths from cold. Heat kills rapidly, and once someone is hypothermic, it is more difficult to treat in a first aid situation than hypothermia. Prevention is better than cure for all temperature/humidity-related risks. This is why education is important.

Climate science denial is deadly. But the problem is that large portions of the population are in denial about catastrophic climate change in spite of the evidence. I have been told that teaching people about Wet Bulb Temperatures is too complicated, it's no more complicated than reading a bus timetable.

You simply need 2 items: A digital hygrometer and thermometer, like the Inkbird and a wet-bulb global temperature table.

Wet-bulb global table
Source

Inkbird temperature/ humidity with data logger & Android App.

Climate denial and heatwave denial lead people to look for examples of people surviving extreme heat/humidity to prove their point. These futile adventures in denialism lead to the unearthing of things like the now-banned Sauna Championships. Banned because people died. Heat kills, and sometimes it can be through human negligence:

"A motivational speaker has been found guilty over the deaths of three people who fell ill during a meeting at an Arizona "sweat lodge".

A jury found James Ray guilty of three counts of "negligent homicide".

The deaths occurred at the Angel Valley Retreat Centre, 115 miles (180km) north of Phoenix, in October 2009.

Ray's lawyers said the deaths were a tragic accident, but prosecutors said he had failed to act when people exhibited signs of distress."


I have talked about the misappropriation of Indigenous North American traditions.

James Arthur Ray, motivational speaker, new age guru & one of the earlier fake shamans. Demonstrated what happens when you ignore people suffering heat stroke. 

"In addition to the three fatalities, about 20 people were hospitalised."


We need to do more than talk about adaptation, especially when adaptation documentation is devoid of information on Wet-bulb temperatures. It's almost like we are not serious about adaptation beyond the most basic.





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