Heat warnings extend: these are the communities that will reach up to 43 degrees

The State Meteorological Agency (AEMET) does not use a single temperature value for all of Spain but sets different thresholds by province and meteorological zone. With these thresholds, it classifies the risk from high temperatures into yellow warnings (low danger), orange (significant danger), and red (extreme or extraordinary danger). In practice, yellow warnings are usually activated in many areas between about 34–39 ºC, orange between 37–40 ºC (or slightly higher in the south), and red in exceptional episodes, around 40–44 ºC, always adapted to the local climate. The numerical details for each zone are included in AEMET's operational guides and plans and in the daily warning maps, not in a single public table.

How AEMET defines heat warnings

According to AEMET's own help on meteorological warnings, each color indicates an increasing level of danger for the population and activities:

• Yellow: potentially dangerous meteorological phenomenon, but with low risk for the general population. It is advised to "stay alert" to developments (AEMET warning help).
• Orange: phenomenon of significant danger, with probable significant impacts on usual activities and notable risk for exposed individuals.
• Red: phenomenon of extreme or extraordinary danger, associated with very serious damage and very high risk for the population, especially if the episode is persistent.

The general scheme of the warning system and its harmonization with European criteria is described in AEMET's technical document on meteorological warnings, available from the Ministry for Ecological Transition (meteorological warning system).

Approximate thresholds and recent examples

The specific values that trigger each level depend on the area, but the synthesis made by specialized media from that operational guide is as follows:

• Yellow heat warning: used when maximum temperatures are expected that, while not extreme for the area, may affect vulnerable people. Approximate range: 34–39 ºC, lower in the north or mountainous areas and higher in the south and interior valleys.
• Orange warning: corresponds to a significant risk. In many territories it is around 37–40 ºC, but in very warm regions of the south or the Ebro valley it may be associated with forecast maxima of 41–42 ºC.
• Red warning: reserved for extraordinary situations, where very unusual values are expected even for warm climates. In recent episodes it has been activated with forecasts between 40–44 ºC in areas such as interior depressions of Lleida, the Ebro valley, or the Guadalquivir, Guadiana, and Tagus valleys, as various heat wave reports have recorded (for example, in heat wave in Spain: red warning, maxima up to 44 degrees or news from other media summarized in Newtral).

These figures are indicative because AEMET combines intensity (the forecast value), the probability of reaching it, the duration of the episode, and the reference climatology of each area.

Differences by provinces and zones

AEMET subdivides the territory into meteorological zones finer than the province (the same used in its Meteoalert system). In practice, this means that within the same province there may be several different thresholds.

The Ministry of Health, when updating its "meteosalud" map, has published some of these reference thresholds by zone, based on AEMET data and studies from the Carlos III Health Institute. The ConSalud report summarizes that

• The highest thresholds are concentrated in Andalusia: the Campiña cordobesa reaches a maximum threshold of 40.4 ºC, and 40 ºC is also set in areas such as Morena and Condado (Jaén), Antequera (Málaga), or the Sierra Norte of Seville (renewed heat map).
• At the opposite extreme, in A Mariña (Lugo) the maximum health impact threshold is set at 25.5 ºC, and in the Asturian coast thresholds around 23.9 ºC have been set for activating health alerts (The Objective).

These "health impact" thresholds are those used by Health for its green–yellow–orange–red levels in the National High Temperatures Plan, but they are built on the same zones and AEMET data (heat prevention plan, official Health note, Moncloa statement).

Where to see the specific thresholds

The detailed table of thresholds by meteorological zone is part of the technical annexes of AEMET's warning system and the epidemiological studies of the Carlos III Health Institute; it does not appear as a simple table on the general public website. Operationally, for each day, it is:

• Check the official AEMET warning map, where the color (yellow, orange, or red) assigned to each zone according to current thresholds already appears (warning help).
• Review, if interested in the health dimension, the risk level map by meteosalud zones published daily by Health (meteosalud map and additional explanations in DiarioFarma and Infosalus).

Recent news from the newspaper Demócrata about the current heat wave remind that these warnings are updated daily and depend on "specific thresholds" by provinces and zones, which may rise or fall as the day approaches (weather this week, alert for intensely high temperatures, alerts for intensely high temperatures, heat wave: AEMET warning, heat wave today, new extreme heat episode, alert for intensely high temperatures in Spain, first heat wave of the summer, Spain reaches maxima of 44 degrees, red warning and affected zones).

The available sources do not provide specific information about the powers of the autonomous communities in managing emergencies caused by heat waves, nor about the applicable civil protection, public health, or environmental regulations in this specific case. What they do allow is to explain, in general terms, how legislative activity is organized in the parliaments (state and autonomous) and why this organization is key to delimiting and exercising material powers, including those related to emergencies. From there, only very general conclusions can be drawn, without entering into the legal detail of the division of functions between the State and communities in this matter.

General framework: who defines the powers

The way powers over emergencies, civil protection, or health are exercised depends on the rules approved by the different legislative chambers (General Courts and autonomous parliaments). Each of these chambers is governed by a parliamentary regulation, which is the set of internal rules that organize its functioning and the processing of laws.

According to the available information, the regulation of each Parliament:

• Organizes the procedures and deadlines for processing bill projects and proposals.
• Sets the requirements for the presentation, debate, and voting of initiatives.
• Regulates the functioning of committees, which are the main space for technical and detailed study of the rules.
• Determines the majorities and quorums required to approve laws.
• Establishes rules of parliamentary discipline and order in debates.

In the case of autonomous communities, their parliaments use this regulatory framework to approve their own laws that develop and specify their powers, including those that could refer to the management of heat waves (for example, through civil protection laws, public health laws, or social services laws).

The role of committees in emergency matters

Parliamentary committees are especially relevant for technical and cross-cutting matters, such as emergency management or health protection. According to the available information, their main functions are:

• Carry out the detailed study and debate of bill projects and proposals referred to them after the general debate.
• Allow the presentation and voting of amendments by parliamentary groups on the articles.
• Prepare a report, which contains the resulting text after incorporating (or rejecting) amendments.
• Send that report to the Plenary, which will vote on the final text, except in cases where the committee has full legislative competence.

In autonomous parliaments, this logic is replicated: a specialized committee (for example, interior, health, or environment) would be responsible for technically working on the rules that define how emergency services are organized, what autonomous plans exist, and how they coordinate with other administrations.

Committees with full legislative competence

The available information also explains the figure of committees with full legislative competence. When a law is processed in one of these committees, the committee itself can approve it definitively, without the text subsequently passing through the Plenary, unless avocation is requested (that is, the Plenary recovers the competence to debate and vote on the rule).

This tool is used to speed up the approval of certain laws. In the context of emergencies, it could be relevant if an autonomous community decided to quickly process a modification of its civil protection or public health legislation, provided its parliamentary regulation foresees this possibility in matters of that nature.

Limits of the available information

With the consulted information, it is not possible to detail:

• The specific material powers of the autonomous communities in emergencies caused by heat waves (for example, who can impose activity restrictions, how alert levels are regulated, or what obligations social and health services have).
• The basic state laws on civil protection, public health, climate change, or environment that set the common framework.
• The specific coordination models between the State, autonomous communities, and municipalities for this type of episodes.

There is no further information in the consulted sources that allows specifying the division of powers or offering precise normative examples about heat waves. To enter into that detail, it would be necessary to access sectoral legislation (state and autonomous) and specific civil protection and public health plans, which are not included in the available material.

There is no consolidated official data that answers how many episodes of red warnings for extreme heat have occurred in Spain in the last ten years. Neither AEMET nor Civil Protection publish, openly, a specific aggregated historical series of "red warning episodes for high temperatures" at the state level. However, there are partial data by summer campaigns and specific periods, which show a very clear trend of increase both in extreme heat episodes and in red level activations, especially since 2022.

What is known with recent official figures

The most complete data available comes from the final report of the 2025 campaign of the National Plan of preventive actions against heat, from the Ministry of Health. According to the La Moncloa press release on extreme heat and mortality in 2025, between May 16 and September 30, 2025, there were:

• 870 level 3 episodes (high risk from extreme heat) in the MeteoSalud health system, 73% more than in 2024.

This health level 3 is coordinated with AEMET meteorological information but does not exactly equate to "a meteorological red warning" by province: it is a maximum health risk episode in a "meteosalud zone." Still, it gives an idea of the magnitude of the problem.

A few months earlier, another official Health note, titled "1,180 deaths attributable to high temperatures since the activation of the heat plan", detailed that between May 16 and July 13, 2025:

• 76 activations of the red level for extreme heat had been recorded in the autonomous communities, compared to none in the same period of 2024.

The same figure appears replicated in the Ministry for Ecological Transition press release on the 2025 heat plan balance, and in analyses by specialized press such as Gaceta Médica [link] or InfoSalus [link].

It is important to emphasize that these "red level activations" refer to the health system (health risk) and are triggered when temperatures far exceed the thresholds of each zone and for several days, according to the algorithm described by Health in various notes, such as the 2025 Heat Plan update [link] and the May 2026 note on heat-associated mortality [link].

AEMET meteorological red warnings: fragmented information

In parallel, AEMET issues its own meteorological warnings (yellow, orange, and red) for high temperatures within the Meteoalert Plan. Some notes and articles make clear that:

• Red warnings are "very exceptional" and only activated in extraordinary meteorological risk situations, as an internal document cited by ElDiario.es reminds.
• In 2024, the red warning associated with the DANA in Valencia and Málaga was the first of the year, according to the same piece.
• The management of some of these warnings has had political and civil protection consequences, as described in the El País report on AEMET–Generalitat Valenciana communication.

However, neither AEMET notes nor annual climate state reports — summarized by MITECO in documents such as "The year 2025 broke temperature records again in Spain" — offer a cumulative count of "how many red warning episodes for heat" have occurred in the last decade.

Press and Demócrata: recent examples, not historical series

The newspaper Demócrata reflects the same lack: it reports in detail on current episodes but does not count how many have occurred in ten years. In pieces about the June and July 2026 heat wave — for example on the red warning and affected zones, on maxima up to 44 degrees, on active alerts and recommendations or the monitoring of chained extreme heat episodes [link]) it notes the existence of red warnings on certain days and territories, but always punctually.

Something similar happens with other media citing Health and AEMET figures, such as Redacción Médica [link], ConSalud [link], Gaceta Médica [link], InfoSalus [link] or The Objective [link] and [link], but none of these sources reconstruct the complete series of red warning episodes for extreme heat for the entire decade.

Conclusion: what can and cannot be stated

With the available information it can be stated with certainty that:

• Extreme heat episodes and red level activations (both health and meteorological) have increased very notably in recent years, with 870 level 3 health episodes just in the summer of 2025 and 76 red level activations for extreme heat between May and July 2025.
• The year 2025 and recent summers (especially 2022 and 2025) rank among the warmest and with the greatest recorded health impact.

But there is no public and consolidated count that allows answering with a single and reliable number how many "red warning episodes for extreme heat" have occurred in Spain in the last ten years. To obtain it, it would be necessary to exploit the detailed historical archive of AEMET warnings and the Heat Plan levels year by year, something not synthesized in accessible documents.