Listen and subscribe to us on your favorite podcast platform:
“…we can still get stuff done in this country when people’s lives are on the line.”
Bill Updike, Director of U.S. Policy & Programs, Smart Surfaces Coalition
Cities are getting hotter, but some of the biggest opportunities to change that may be hiding in plain sight—in the roofs, roads and parking lots that surround us every day.
- Why it matters: Extreme heat is the leading weather-related cause of death in the U.S., according to a September 2025 GAO report. Dark roofs and pavement make it worse, soaking up the sun’s heat all day and releasing it at night.
- The question: The fixes are old and simple–cool roofs, lighter pavement, more shade. So why aren’t more cities using them?
- Why here: The I-10 corridor runs through some of the hottest cities in the country, and four of the Smart Surfaces Coalition’s ten partner cities are on it: Phoenix, San Antonio, New Orleans and Jacksonville.
Green building expert, Bill Updike, takes us inside an effort to rethink those surfaces. His organization, the Smart Surfaces Coalition, brings together more than forty organizations to help cities move from recognizing the problem to acting on it, with the maps, cost-benefit tools, and model policies to get there.
But if the solutions are relatively straightforward, why aren’t more cities adopting them? Updike describes the less visible barriers standing in the way, the cities finding creative ways around them, and the political trend he now sees as the biggest risk to the whole effort.
In this episode, Bill Updike, Director of U.S. Policy & Programs at the Smart Surfaces Coalition and formerly chief of green building and climate policy for Washington, DC, discusses what it takes to get a city to build differently.
Relevant Articles and Resources
- Smart Surfaces Coalition Tools (see Resources menu)
- REPORT: “Extreme Heat: Limited FEMA Assistance Highlights Need for Reevaluation of Agency’s Role” (Government Accountability Office, September 2025)
- “Phoenix has a new 5-year, $60M shade plan. Is it enough to cool down the city?” (KJZZ, September 2026)
- “US cities using smart surfaces, strategies to cool residents” (The Nation’s Health, October 2025)
Relevant Ten Across Conversations Podcasts
- Building Heat Resilience with Kathy Baughman McLeod & David Hondula
- 10X Convergence: The Region’s Experts Convene to Address the Insurability Crisis
- Jeff Goodell on the Science and Accountability of Extreme Heat
Credits
Host: Duke Reiter
Producer and editor: Bryce Cristiano
Research and support provided by: Kate Carefoot, Rae Ulrich, and Sabine Butler
Guest Speaker
Bill Updike is Director of U.S. Policy & Programs at the Smart Surfaces Coalition. He was previously a principal at the engineering firm Integral Group, where he developed climate action plans for cities and zero-carbon plans for colleges and universities. Before that, he was Chief of the Green Building and Climate Branch at Washington, DC’s Department of Energy and Environment. There he chaired the group behind the first city adoption of all major chapters of the International Green Construction Code, led the effort to create the first city-based Green Bank in the U.S., and helped introduce the first mandatory minimum energy performance standard for existing buildings. He began his career as an environmental journalist for two national magazines. In 2015 he received one of the U.S. Green Building Council’s inaugural BOLD Awards.
