Since 1970, summer temperatures in Reno, Nevada, have risen 10.9 degrees, making it the nation鈥檚 fastest-warming city, , a nonprofit research group.
Ranked second is Las Vegas, Nevada, which has seen an increase of 5.8 degrees. Boise, Idaho, follows in third at 5.6 degrees.
Stephanie McAfee, Nevada state climatologist, says a contributing factor to the warming is urban growth. Those three Mountain West cities, she explains, are expanding quickly, turning undeveloped land into new homes and roads.
鈥淎 light-colored bit of ground, sand or concrete or something is going to be cooler than a black asphalt roadway,鈥� McAfee said. 鈥淎s we have darker colored materials in the city, they can absorb more heat.鈥�
And those materials release the heat at night, causing warmer-than-usual overnight temperatures. In Reno, the nighttime summer temps have jumped from the upper 40s and low 50s to the high 50s and mid-60s, according to McAfee.
This phenomenon is known as the 鈥�.鈥�
As a result, she says, air conditioning is becoming a bigger part of people鈥檚 budgets. That鈥檚 at a time when U.S. consumers are dealing with the
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