Urban Climate
Urban Climate Modeling involves the development and use of mathematical and computational models, aiming to understand and predict the distinct two-way interactions between cities and the atmosphere. It is important for various reasons, including urban planning and public health to help providing the residents with thermal comfort and cleaner air. At the Atmospheric Modeling & Remote Sensing group at Empa, we contribute to this endeavor.
Our urban climate modeling efforts focus on integrating novel urban canopy models to mesoscale numerical weather prediction models and enhance their physical representations of surface energy balance, radiation exchange, and turbulent fluxes. Additionally, we strive to devise solutions that aid urban planning at the stakeholder level, ultimately enhancing comfort levels in various aspects of daily life.
Applications
- Investigating the influence of urban parks and street trees on improving cooling potential and thermal comfort for city residents through shading, sheltering, and evapotranspiration.
- Examining how various forms of street vegetation can enhance the absorption of CO2 and other greenhouse gases emitted by industrial processes, residential heating, and transportation within urban areas.
Publications
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Mussetti, G., Brunner, D., Allegrini, J., Wicki, A., Schubert, S., & Carmeliet, J. (2019). Simulating urban climate at sub‐kilometre scale for representing the intra‐urban variability of Zurich, Switzerland. In-ternational Journal of Climatology, 40(1), 458-476.
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Mussetti, G., Brunner, D., Henne, S., Allegrini, J., Krayenhoff, E. S., Schubert, S., Feigenwinter, C., Vogt, R., Wicki, A., & Carmeliet, J. (2020). COSMO-BEP-Tree v1.0: a coupled urban climate model with ex-plicit representation of street trees. Geoscientific Model Deelopment, 13, 1685–1710.
Publication Link
