Every morning I watch the same thing happen.

The sun rises over our home in western Massachusetts and begins pouring energy onto the solar panels we installed more than a decade ago. For 14 hours they quietly produce enough electricity to run our air conditioning, appliances, computers, lights, and much of our household. On the hottest days of the year there is something deeply satisfying about this arrangement. The very force making the day dangerous is also providing the means to protect ourselves from it.

Then I think about my neighbors. One elderly couple told me they spent the recent heat wave sitting in a single air-conditioned room because they could not afford to cool the entire house. Another conversation left me wondering whether our local elementary school actually serves as a cooling center. I had been told it was air-conditioned. Perhaps it is. Perhaps it isn’t. The fact that I do not know says something important.

In every community we know where the library is. We know where the fire station is. We know where to vote. Why don’t we know where people can survive extreme heat? That is because we still think of heat as weather instead of infrastructure. Extreme heat is rapidly becoming one of the deadliest climate hazards in the United States. Yet unlike hurricanes or blizzards, it leaves behind no dramatic photographs. Instead, people quietly die in apartments, nursing homes, assisted living facilities, mobile homes, and isolated houses. Older adults, people with disabilities, and people with chronic illnesses are especially vulnerable. Heat kills by exploiting existing inequalities.

The person with adequate income buys insulation, efficient air conditioning, solar panels, backup batteries, and a well-sealed home. The person living on Social Security chooses between the electric bill and groceries. The difference in survival is often measured not in resilience but in monthly income. That is not a meteorological problem. It is distributive justice.

We already understand this principle in winter. No civilized society says that freezing is simply an unfortunate consequence of cold weather. Communities open warming centers. Utilities are prohibited from shutting off heat during winter emergencies. Public officials understand that exposure to dangerous cold creates public obligations. Why should heat be different? If we accept a public responsibility not to let people freeze, we should also accept a public responsibility not to let them bake.

Solar energy is usually discussed as environmental policy. It is also social policy. My rooftop panels do more than reduce carbon emissions. They create resilience. During the hottest part of the day, the very hours when electricity demand peaks, they generate the power that cools our home.

Now imagine that principle scaled to every community. Every town should have publicly accessible cooling centers designed specifically for older adults and people with disabilities powered by solar. Schools, senior centers, libraries, municipal buildings, and community centers should be equipped with solar arrays, battery storage, backup power, accessible transportation, medical equipment charging stations, and spaces where people can remain safely throughout prolonged heat emergencies. These should not be emergency improvisations. They should be permanent civic infrastructure.

The moral question is surprisingly simple. When we possess the technology to protect vulnerable people from predictable harm, what justifies not using it? Solar panels, battery storage, and efficient cooling systems are no longer experimental. We know who is most at risk, and we know what interventions work. Failure begins to look less like bad luck and more like political choice. At some point, neglect acquires moral significance.

This issue also exposes a deeper inequality. Climate adaptation increasingly belongs to those who can purchase it. Wealth buys solar panels, generators, better insulation, electric vehicles that double as backup batteries, and homes designed to remain habitable during extreme weather. Everyone else receives weather forecasts advising them to stay inside, as though staying inside were itself a public policy. Justice requires that resilience become a public good rather than a private luxury.

The measure of a society is not whether it can develop remarkable technologies but whether it distributes their benefits fairly. Artificial intelligence raises that question. Healthcare raises that question. Housing raises that question. Now extreme heat raises it as well.

The issue is not whether enough sunlight falls on our communities. Every hot day reminds us that it does. The issue is whether we organize ourselves so that the energy falling on our roofs protects everyone, or only those who can afford to capture it. That is not a question about climate. It is a question about justice.

James A. Lomastro lives in Conway.