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The RIHN project “Human impacts on urban subsurface environments” aims to suggest improved development plans of urban centers for human well-being. This will be done by examining reconstructed past changes in urban environments, and by developing integrated nature-social models. Subsurface environmental indicators are developed from the points of view of: (1) human activities; (2) climate change; and (3) character of urban development and social policies. Water, heat, and material environments and transport vectors are being evaluated by a number of different approaches. Some of these include investigating changes in groundwater resources using satellite observations, reconstructing effects of climate change and urbanization using subsurface thermal regimes, and evaluating past contamination patterns from preserved subsurface records. In this overview paper, we describe the current status of urbanization in Asia, subsurface water conditions, material and contaminant transport to surface waters by groundwater, and subsurface thermal anomalies due to the heat island effect. The rapid pace of urbanization in Asia requires that we develop a better understanding of how to deal with environmental impacts, both above and below ground. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]