Thermal comfort levels classified by aspect ratio and orientation for three zones of a street in Rotterdam

Abstract

Thermal comfort and micro-climates around buildings are important issues in urban planning that affect everyone's daily lives. During heat waves, the Mean Radiant Temperature (Tmrt) has been found to be closely connected to the thermal comfort distribution at the micro-scale. In this study, we built a computerized model of idealized buildings, all with the same height, but with variable street widths and orientations. An established radiation model, Solar Long Wave Environmental Irradiance Geometry, was utilized to simulate spatial variations of Tmrt, and generate thermal comfort classifications based on the simulated statistical distributions. Simulation results were analysed by comparing different street aspect ratios and the impact of orientation for three different street zones. By quantifying the thermal comfort in a specific urban environment, our findings provide a process that enables architects and urban planners to accurately determine the impact of site-specific factors on the thermal comfort of their designs.