Global Urban Heat Island Mitigation

Global Urban Heat Island Mitigation provides a comprehensive picture of global UHI micro-thermal interaction in different built environments. The book explains physical principles and how to moderate undesirable consequences of swift and haphazard urban development to create more sustainable and resilient cities. Sections provide extensive discussion on numerous UHI mitigation technologies and their effectiveness in cities around the globe. In addition, the book proposes novel UHI mitigation technologies and strategies while also assessing the effectiveness and suitability of UHI mitigation interventions in various climates and urban forms. Adopts a multidisciplinary approach, bridging theoretical and applied urban climatology with urban heat mitigation Compiles disparate urban climate research concepts and technologies into a coherent framework Includes contributions from leaders in fields from around the globe

Urban heat islands are a new type of microclimatic phenomenon that causes a significant increase in the temperature of cities compared to surrounding areas. The phenomenon has been enforced by the current trend towards climate change. Although experts consider urban heat islands an urgent European Union public health concern, there are too few policies that address it. The EU carried out a project to learn more about this phenomenon through pilot initiatives. The pilots included feasibility studies and strategies for appropriately altering planning rules and governance to tackle the problem of urban heat islands. The pilots were carried out in eight metropolitan areas: Bologna/Modena, Budapest, Ljubljana, Lodz, Prague, Stuttgart, Venice/Padova, and Vienna. The feasibility studies carried out in these pilot areas focused on the specific morphology of EU urban areas, which are often characterised by the presence of historical old towns.

This book discusses the concepts and technologies associated with the mitigation of urban heat islands (UHIs) that are applicable in hot and humid regions. It presents several city case studies on how UHIs can be reduced in various areas to provide readers, researchers, and policymakers with insights into the concepts and technologies that should be considered when planning and constructing urban centres and buildings. The rapid development of urban areas in hot and humid regions has led to an increase in urban temperatures, a decrease in ventilation in buildings, and a transformation of the once green outdoor environment into areas full of solar-energy-absorbing concrete and asphalt. This situation has increased the discomfort of people living in these areas regardless of whether they occupy concrete structures. This is because indoor and outdoor air quality have both suffered from urbanisation. The development of urban areas has also increased energy consumption so that the occupants of buildings can enjoy indoor thermal comfort and air quality that they need via air conditioning systems. This book offers solutions to the recent increase in the number of heat islands in hot and humid regions.​

Heat islands are urban and suburban areas that are significantly warmer than their surroundings. Traditional, highly absorptive construction materials and a lack of effective landscaping are their main causes. Heat island problems, in terms of increased energy consumption, reduced air quality and effects on human health and mortality, are becoming more pressing as cities continue to grow and sprawl. This comprehensive book brings together the latest information about heat islands and their mitigation. The book describes how heat islands are formed, what problems they cause, which technologies mitigate heat island effects and what policies and actions can be taken to cool communities. Internationally renowned expert Lisa Gartland offers a comprehensive source of information for turning heat islands into cool communities. The author includes sections on cool roofing and cool paving, explains their benefits in detail and provides practical guidelines for their selection and installation. The book also reviews how and why to incorporate trees and vegetation around buildings, in parking lots and on green roofs.

The Urban Heat Island (UHI) is an area of growing interest for many people studying the urban environment and local/global climate change. The UHI has been scientifically studied for 200 years and, although it is an apparently simple phenomenon, there is considerable confusion around the different types of UHI and their assessment. The Urban Heat Island—A Guidebook provides simple instructions for measuring and analysing the phenomenon, as well as greater context for defining the UHI and the impacts it can have. Readers will be empowered to work within a set of guidelines that enable direct comparison of UHI effects across diverse settings, while informing a wide range of climate mitigation and adaptation programs to modify human behaviour and the built form. This opens the door to true global assessments of local climate change in cities. Urban planning and design strategies can then be evaluated for their effectiveness at mitigating these changes. Covers both on-surface and near-surface, or canopy, measurements and impacts of Urban Heat Islands (UHI) Provides a set of best practices and guidelines for UHI observation and analysis Includes both conceptual overviews and practical instructions for a wide range of uses

The combination of global warming and urban sprawl is the origin of the most hazardous climate change effect detected at urban level: Urban Heat Island, representing the urban overheating respect to the countryside surrounding the city. This book includes 18 papers representing the state of the art of detection, assessment mitigation and adaption to urban overheating. Advanced methods, strategies and technologies are here analyzed including relevant issues as: the role of urban materials and fabrics on urban climate and their potential mitigation, the impact of greenery and vegetation to reduce urban temperatures and improve the thermal comfort, the role the urban geometry in the air temperature rise, the use of satellite and ground data to assess and quantify the urban overheating and develop mitigation solutions, calculation methods and application to predict and assess mitigation scenarios. The outcomes of the book are thus relevant for a wide multidisciplinary audience, including: environmental scientists and engineers, architect and urban planners, policy makers and students.

The urban climate is continuously deteriorating. Urban heat lowers the quality of urban life, increases energy needs, and affects the urban socio-economy. Urban Climate Mitigation Techniques presents steps that can be taken to mitigate this situation through a series of innovative technologies and examples of best practices for the improvement of the urban climate. Including tools for evaluation and a comparative analysis, this book addresses anthropogenic heat, green areas, cool materials and pavements, outdoor shading structures, evaporative cooling and earth cooling. Case studies demonstrate the success and applicability of these measures in various cities throughout the world. Useful for urban designers, architects and planners, Urban Climate Mitigation Techniques is a step by step tour of the innovative technologies improving our urban climate, providing a holistic approach supported by well-established quantitative examples.

Urban Heat Island Modeling for Tropical Climates takes into account the different urban physics in tropical environments, presenting a way of UHI scaling for tropical cities. Topics include measuring, modeling and proper mitigation strategies, which account for the surface energy balance of tropics. Tropical cities are more susceptible to the effects of projected global warming because of conditions in tropical climates and the rapid growth of so many cities in this zone. The need for research on measuring, modeling and mitigation of UHI effects in tropical cities is of growing importance. This book walks through the basics of Urban Heat Islands, including causes, measurement and analysis then expands upon issues as well as the novel techniques that can be used to address issues specific to the region. Reviews topics related to understanding the fundamentals of modeling and impacts of urban heat islands Covers many techniques, from remote sensing, to numerical modeling and then applying them to urban climate studies in general, and in tropical cities Describes the scaling of urban heat islands based on long-term seasonal thermal parameters as feature-based classification systems using a probabilistic and fuzzy logic approach, unlike local climate zones (LCZs)