Almost all skin cancers are caused by overexposure to UV radiation, children and young people are particularly at risk.2
High quality and well-designed shade can reduce exposure to the sun's harmful UV rays by up to 75%.1 When used with other effective forms of sun protection, shade is one of the best ways to prevent skin cancer.
Discover more about designing natural and built shade, plus how to make shade a long term planning and design priority for sun protection in our playgrounds, parks and outdoor public spaces.
Find out about how the sun's path and shadows affects specific public spaces with SunCalc.
In this section
Discover why high quality shade is important for ultraviolet radiation protection and how it can protect you from skin cancer.
A combination of natural shade and built shade gives the highest quality sun protection from ultraviolet (UV) radiation.
Learn about our pledge to prevent skin cancer by benchmarking shade in NSW playgrounds.
ShadeSmart is a new program created for landscape architects and other built environment professionals to improve their awareness and understanding of high quality shade design for UV and heat protection.
Explore our helpful resources for making shade a design and planning priority in your local, school and community park.
1. Parsons, P., Neale, R., Wolski, P. & Green, A. 1998, ‘The shady side of solar protection’, Medical Journal of Australia, 168: 327–330
2. Arnold, M., de Vries, E., Whiteman, D., Jemal, A., Bray, F., Parkin, D.M., Soerjomataram, 2018. Global burden of cutaneous melanoma attributable to ultraviolet radiation in 2012, Int. J. Cancer: 143, 1305-1314
