Dynamical Downscaling of Future Climate Change Scenarios in Urban Heat Island and Its Neighborhood in a Brazilian Subtropical Area

Marcos Vinicius Bueno De Morais,Viviana Vanesa Urbina Guerrero,Jorge Alberto Martins,Leila Droprinchinski Martins

doi:10.3390/ecas2017-04130

Marcos Vinicius Bueno De Morais, Viviana Vanesa Urbina Guerrero + Show 2 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.3390/ecas2017-04130

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Publication Date: Jul 17, 2017
Citations: 8	License type: CC BY 4.0

Affiliation: Universidade Tecnológica Federal do Paraná

Abstract

According to IPCC reports, a greater frequency, intensity and duration of heat waves in urban areas are expected. This is related to the dynamical evolution of the cities, due the changes of the natural surface modifies the roughness pattern reduce the wind intensity, modify the available humidity in the soil and the radiative properties. These topics characterize the formation of the urban heat island (UHI). A dynamical downscaling of A2 and B1 future scenarios was made for Londrina, a medium-size city of Southern Brazil, using Weather Research Forecasting model, to investigate the impact of this projections on the UHI formation and intensity, as well for rural area, which consistent an important agricultural landscape. For this, an evaluation of the model and the scenarios were done to investigate the current trends. The results shows a tendency of following the worst proposed scenarios (A2), and a drier rural area for the sustainable projection, which has directly influence on the urban heat island intensity and formation, and in the agriculture of the region.

Highlights

The study of the climate in urban areas is one of the most priority places when the central topic is the climate changes impacts, because today more than 50% of world population lives in urban regions
The normalized Taylor Diagram [48] for temperature and specific humidity was analyzed for both stations and for each different input data, where SRESA2 is the simulation with A2 scenario as input, SRESB1 is with B1 scenario and GFS is the simulation with GFS
This work presented an analysis of the physical processes in the formation and intensity of the urban heat island (UHI) for the city of Londrina, using 3 dynamically downscalled scenarios: the present one—through the simulation with the GFS data as input; the SRESA2—using the A2 climate scenario, considered the most pessimistic; and SRESB1—using scenario B1, considered the most sustainable

Summary

Introduction

The study of the climate in urban areas is one of the most priority places when the central topic is the climate changes impacts, because today more than 50% of world population lives in urban regions. According to the last two IPCC reports [1,2], there are a prediction of more frequent occurrence of heat waves in urban areas, with higher intensity and duration [3]. Previous studies have showed that urban areas are vulnerable to extreme events and climate changes. Numerical studies employing the A1B scenario from IPCC [5] shows that the Frankfurt city, in Germany, could present more days (about 32) with maximum temperature above 25 °C for the period between 2021 and 2050, compared to 1971 to 2000 [6]. For Brussels and Paris, using the same A1B scenario, the projection are that the temperature will increase about 1.6 °C and 1.8 °C, respectively in 2050-year [7]. This study found a pattern in the changes of the temperatures

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