Abstract
Over the last few decades, Urban Heat Stress (UHS) has become a crucial concern of scientists and policy-makers. Many projects have been implemented to mitigate Urban Heat Island (UHI) effects using nature-based solutions. However, decision-making and selecting an adequate framework are difficult because of complex interactions between natural, social, economic and built environments. This paper contributes to the UHI issue by: (i) identifying the most important key factors of a Decision Support Tool (DST) used for urban heat mitigation, (ii) presenting multi-criteria methods applied to urban heat resilience, (iii) reviewing existing spatial and non-spatial DSTs, (iv) and analyzing, classifying and ranking DSTs. It aims to help decision-makers through an overview of the pros and cons of existing DSTs and indicate which tool is providing maximum support for choosing and planning heat resilience measures from the designing phase to the heat mitigation phase. This review shows that Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis (MCDA) can be used for any pilot site and the criteria can be adapted to the given location accordingly. It also highlights that GIS-based spatial tools have an effective decision support system (DSS) because they offer a quick assessment of interventions and predict long-term effects of urban heat. Through a comparative study using specific chosen criteria, we conclude that the DSS tool is well suited and fulfils many prerequisites to support new policies and interventions to mitigate UHS.
Highlights
Urbanization and an exponential increase in population have brought the concept of Urban Heat Island (UHI) and heat stress into the limelight
This paper presents a comprehensive review of Decision Support Tool (DST) in the essence of UHI, climate change adaptation, and heat stress
The Analytical hierarchy process (AHP) is a qualitative approach and depends on the judgments of the people who are involved in the task, but lengthy pairwise comparisons might lead to inconsistency
Summary
Urbanization and an exponential increase in population have brought the concept of Urban Heat Island (UHI) and heat stress into the limelight. The world has seen adverse effects, a rise in air temperature, a higher mortality rate, and changes in weather patterns [1]. Different authors explained that UHI has severe effects on the most vulnerable populations, especially during the summer season. This phenomenon highly raises the consumption of cooling energy as well as the corresponding peak electricity demand of cities. Urban Heat Stress (UHS) severely affects health, comfort, and increases mortality problems [3]. Urban planners and policy-makers are keen to address issues such as increased urban heat due to climate change triggered by human activities
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