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Weather and City Infrastructure

Hi Delegates!

Hope you all are super excited for conference. Our dais is looking forward to reading your position papers and finally meeting you in person. This week, I wanted to talk about the extreme cold weather that has hit the Midwest and how this relates to city infrastructure. Please refer to the following article for more information: https://www.harborlightnews.com/articles/arctic-temperatures-lead-to-michigan-state-of-emergency-tips-for-dealing-with-regions-bitter-cold-weather/

The article explains how temperatures have hit sub-zero in Michigan, with wind chills predicted to be around -50 degrees. This weather negatively affects residents in many ways, including health concerns, frozen pipes, barriers to transportation, and rising costs of electricity bills due to heating. The article offers some advice on how to handle these problems, but there are limits on what we can do. Right now, cities have limited resources and may not be able to efficiently handle the weather situation. This poses an interesting question--how can we develop cities in the future to deal with these types of situations in more effective ways? Perhaps think about smart grids, energy distribution, more robust pipes, or better street maintenance. When writing your resolutions, make sure to keep your country's environment in mind. How do weather patterns, natural landscapes, or resources affect urban development for your country?

Comments

  1. Nepal is home to some of the harshest weather and terrain in the world, as it beholds earths tallest mountain rage, the Himalayas. The geological aspects of Nepal have made infrastructure development challenging, but in some cases engineers have uses the rough weather to their advantage. For example, the Himalayas create a barrier that traps winds coming in from warmer southern regions making wind power extremely viable in remote locations. Furthermore higher altitudes mean thinner atmospheres, thus making solar energy more efficient. Using these two aspects in combination Nepal developed domestic wind solar energy capture locations to provide energy to inhabitants of rural regions.

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