Abstract
Abstract This study evaluated the thermal conditions of urban areas in Petrolina-PE, from continuous data collected in urban and rural areas for the year of 2012. The results characterized urban heat islands (UHI) with varying intensity in urban areas, especially UHI = 5.3 °C (high intensity) occurred on April 28, 2012. It was evident that the constituent elements of urban areas contribute to the formation and expansion of UHI bringing thermal discomfort for its inhabitants. An adaptation to Thom’s equation for calculating the Thermal Discomfort Index (DIT), was used to obtain the maximum (DITx) and minimum (DITm) thermal discomfort. In the urban area, the DITm indicated thermal comfort in 23.0% of the days and partial comfort in 77.0% of days surveyed. Already, the DITx characterized 71.6% of days with partial comfort and 28.4% of days with thermal discomfort. In the rural area, The DITm indicated that 41.5% of days were thermally comfortable and 58.5% of days had partial comfort. However, the DITx pointed 87.7% of the days of this environment with partial thermal comfort and 12.3% of thermally uncomfortable days. Finally, the results showed that afforestation of urban area constitutes to an effective and efficient way to mitigate thermal discomfort.
Highlights
Many cities have been seen as icons of the environmental crisis, problems related to urban space are the most diverse and among the possible issues are most prominent climate change
This study aimed to evaluate the occurrence of heat islands and the level of thermal discomfort in the urban area of the municipality of Petrolina-PE
The urban area data were obtained from the meteorological station of National Institute of Meteorology (INMET), located in the neighborhood Gercino Rabbit, while data from the rural area were obtained from the Meteorological Station of the Federal University of the San Francisco River Valley (UNIVASF), located at Road BR 407, km 12 - Nilo Coelho Irrigation Project - C1
Summary
Many cities have been seen as icons of the environmental crisis, problems related to urban space are the most diverse and among the possible issues are most prominent climate change. The perception that the city is a modifier of climate and human activities that cause changes in the atmosphere triggered climate studies that forms in the cities, called urban climate, which constitutes one of the most relevant factors for the environmental quality of built environment (Andrade, 2005; Coltri et al, 2007). The human activities cause changes in the atmosphere triggered climate studies of the cities, called urban climate, which constitutes one of the most relevant factors for the environmental quality of the built environment (Coltri et al, 2007). According to Johansson (2006), in hot and dry climates, a compact urban model is preferable. Thermal comfort can be approached based on human and environmental variables (Armelin and Krüger, 2002; Nicol and Humphreys, 2002; Barbosa et al, 2003; Corbella and Yannas, 2003; Farm and Labaki, 2003; Kwok and Chun, 2003; Prado and Ferreira, 2005; and Lamberts et al, 2011)
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