The sweltering heat this summer has disrupted people’s lives in myriad ways and figures show it is now one of the most common forms of severe weather disruption facing businesses – but not in transport.
Office for National Statistics (ONS) found transport and storage was the only sector to see a reduction in the number of companies reporting a heat-related impact on their operations.
The ONS business insights survey showed that the proportion had edged down year-on-year from 6.8% to 5.7%.
This was in contrast to industries such as manufacturing, where the proportion jumped from 2.2% in June 2025 to 12.4% in June this year. In retail the increase was from 6.1% to 8.5%.
The statistics showed that flooding, not heat, was the most commonly reported severe weather issue in haulage and logistics, at 7.6%.
Heat and storms were tied at 5.7%.
David Jinks, head of consumer research at Parcelhero, said it was striking that just 1.4% of transport and storage firms had taken action to adapt to temperature increases, far below manufacturing (13%) and retail (6.8%).
“What this data shows is a widening gap between exposure and preparedness,” he said.
“Manufacturers are feeling the heat, quite literally, and are starting to act on it. Retailers are seeing the same weather pattern but haven’t yet caught up on formal risk planning.
“And transport and storage businesses, who are arguably the most physically exposed to a warming climate, are the least likely to have taken any adaptive action at all, largely because of cost.”
A report published last year warned that the global supply chain was under threat due to climate change making sea levels rise and creating extreme weather patterns.
The Urgent Guidance for Ports, Waterways and Logistics Operations report from insurer TT Club said hurricanes, flooding, heatwaves and shifting ocean currents were all signifiers of climate change, which threatened port assets as well as the global supply chains that depended on them.
