Urban Micro-Meteorological Researches

A special issue of Atmosphere (ISSN 2073-4433). This special issue belongs to the section "Meteorology".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (20 February 2023) | Viewed by 5730

Special Issue Editors

School of Atmospheric Sciences, Sun Yat-sen University, Zhuhai 519082, China
Interests: source profile; source apportionment; emission inventory validation
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
School of Atmospheric Sciences, Sun Yat-sen University, Zhuhai 519082, China
Interests: urban micro-climate modelling; computational fluid dynamics (CFD); wind comfort; thermal comfort; pollutant dispersion
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

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Guest Editor
School of Atmospheric Sciences, Sun Yat-sen University, Zhuhai 519082, China
Interests: urban wind environment; built environment; natural ventilation; wind tunnel test; computational fluid dynamics
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Nowadays, 55% of the world’s population are living in urban areas. The proportion is projected to increase to 68% by 2050. Rapid urbanization is accompanied by a series of environmental issues, such as weakened city ventilation, intensified urban heat island, and deteriorating urban air quality, which pose great threats to human health, outdoor thermal comfort and energy costs. Urban warming is much greater than the global average, and urban heat island occurs when a city experiences much warmer temperatures than surrounding rural areas. Urban dwellers often face higher exposure to pollutants from traffic and energy-related emissions. In addition, the urban micro-climate interacts with indoor ventilation, human exhaled droplet transmission, as well as building energy consumption. An advanced understanding of mechanical and thermal processes in the urban environment is important for formulating effective strategies to improve city ventilation and optimize urban surface thermal properties. The related research will support city design, urban planning, and air quality management in order to create healthy, energy-efficient, and sustainable cities for our future.

This Special Issue aims to collect updated research related to urban micro-meteorology. The topics include but are not limited to

  • Urban wind and turbulence
  • Ventilation and pollutant dispersion in/over urban areas
  • Urban thermal environment and urban heat island
  • Urban energy balance
  • Urban canopy parameterization
  • Natural ventilation in built environment
  • Indoor/outdoor respiratory droplets transmission
  • Interaction between urban micro-climate and building energy
  • Urban wind safety and outdoor thermal comfort.

Dr. Ziwei Mo
Dr. Yaxing Du
Dr. Xuelin Zhang
Guest Editors

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Keywords

  • wind and thermal environment
  • turbulence
  • ventilation
  • pollutant dispersion
  • urban heat island
  • urban energy balance
  • urban canopy
  • respiratory droplets transmission
  • building energy
  • wind safety
  • thermal comfort
  • air pollution

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Published Papers (3 papers)

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Research

19 pages, 7981 KiB  
Article
Influence of Various Urban Morphological Parameters on Urban Canopy Ventilation: A Parametric Numerical Study
by Liyue Zeng, Xuelin Zhang, Jun Lu, Yongcai Li, Jian Hang, Jiajia Hua, Bo Zhao and Hong Ling
Atmosphere 2024, 15(3), 352; https://doi.org/10.3390/atmos15030352 - 13 Mar 2024
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1250
Abstract
Numerical simulation is vital for evaluating urban ventilation. However, accurate urban-scale ventilation modeling requires extensive building surface simulation for computational demand. The distributed drag force approach simplifies the urban canopy by modeling buildings as a porous volume that accounts for momentum and turbulence. [...] Read more.
Numerical simulation is vital for evaluating urban ventilation. However, accurate urban-scale ventilation modeling requires extensive building surface simulation for computational demand. The distributed drag force approach simplifies the urban canopy by modeling buildings as a porous volume that accounts for momentum and turbulence. This method is a practical solution for simulating urban airflow. The drag force coefficient (Cd) is a crucial aerodynamic parameter in this approach. This study examines how Cd varies with urban design parameters such as plan area density (λp), average building height (H), frontal area density (λf), floor aspect ratio (AR), and sky view factor (SVF). Employing extensive numerical simulations conducted under neutral atmospheric conditions, we explore ranges of λp = 0.04–0.07 and λf = 0.1–1.2. The numerical model has been validated against existing wind tunnel data. The results show that Cd is insensitive to the model scale and background wind speed. We discover a nonlinear relationship between Cd and the parameters λp, λf, and SVF. For urban layouts with cubic-shaped buildings, Cd peaks at different λp within the range of 0.2~0.8. When λp and H are constant, Cd has a linear relationship with AR and λf. It is recommended to use λp, SVF, and AR as predictors for Cd across various urban configurations. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Urban Micro-Meteorological Researches)
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18 pages, 7636 KiB  
Article
The Effect of Greening Layout on Microclimate in Urban Residential Areas in Hot Summer–Cold Winter Zones
by Fangqi Lu, Yafeng Gao, Lina Jiang, Yangyang Chen and Zhongyu Hao
Atmosphere 2023, 14(12), 1824; https://doi.org/10.3390/atmos14121824 - 15 Dec 2023
Cited by 3 | Viewed by 1476
Abstract
Appropriate greening design can enhance the microclimate of residential areas. This study investigated different greening cases for residential buildings in hot summer–cold winter zones. Four sorts of greening layouts were tested in a residential area in Chongqing, China. Arbor–grass mix and arbor–shrub–grass mix [...] Read more.
Appropriate greening design can enhance the microclimate of residential areas. This study investigated different greening cases for residential buildings in hot summer–cold winter zones. Four sorts of greening layouts were tested in a residential area in Chongqing, China. Arbor–grass mix and arbor–shrub–grass mix showed effective cooling and humidifying effects, and were chosen for further study using the ENVI-met model. The simulations were conducted in Chongqing, comparing sixteen greening cases for determinant and enclosed building forms. Results indicate that the greening design for determinant layout should give priority to ensuring the greening area and shortening the distance from the sidewalk. While enclosed layout should concentrate greening in dense populations, using arbor–shrub–grass mix to improve the wind environment. In cases where the distribution of arbors and shrubs covers a ratio of 7:4, constituting 30% of the overall green space, there is a reduction in environmental temperature by 1.4 °C and in PET by 4.8 °C. This study provides the optimal greening layout for two types of residential areas in China’s hot summer–cold winter zones, guiding landscape construction in these residential areas to optimize the microclimate. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Urban Micro-Meteorological Researches)
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17 pages, 12363 KiB  
Article
Field Survey on Local Thermal Comfort of Students at a University Campus: A Case Study in Shanghai
by Lin Liu, Zhenxi Liang, Jing Liu, Jing Du and Huibo Zhang
Atmosphere 2022, 13(9), 1433; https://doi.org/10.3390/atmos13091433 - 5 Sep 2022
Cited by 5 | Viewed by 1935
Abstract
University campuses have various functional outdoor spaces characterized by diversified spatial morphology. This study focuses on the local thermal environment of a university campus by conducting fixed weather station monitoring and a mobile survey on a typical summer day. Questionnaire results of college [...] Read more.
University campuses have various functional outdoor spaces characterized by diversified spatial morphology. This study focuses on the local thermal environment of a university campus by conducting fixed weather station monitoring and a mobile survey on a typical summer day. Questionnaire results of college students accompanied by the surrounding climatic conditions reveal obvious linear relationships between thermal sensation voting (TSV) and thermal index physiological equivalent temperature (PET). The range from 29.16 °C to 32.04 °C of the PET is discussed as evaluating the thermal neutral sensation. The PET variations at nine test sites are different due to their different surrounding environments. Mobile survey results across the whole university campus emphasize that the PET varied with time and space in local zones. Spatial differences in the thermal environment are small at 9:00 and larger at 14:00. A correlation analysis of the local Ta and relative humidity (RH) reveals the different effects of spatial morphology characteristic parameters. After calculating the averaged PET values of local zones, problem zones with a higher PET exceeding the thermal neutral limit are recognized. Appropriate optimization on the geometry layouts and land cover patterns is proposed, which would help guide environmentally comfortable university campus design. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Urban Micro-Meteorological Researches)
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