SEASONAL IMPACT OF BUILDING DENSITIES AND URBAN FOREST CONFIGURATIONS ON THE THERMAL CONDITIONS IN URBAN CANYONS. THE CASE OF MENDOZA’S METROPOLITAN AREA IN ARGENTINA

CORREA, ERICA; MARTINEZ, CLAUDIA F.; CANTÓN, M. ALICIA

Dublin

Conferencia; Conference on Passive and Low Energy Architecture (PLEA 2008); 2008

The characterization of urban radiative fields is fundamental information to assess the energy consumption’s increase and the environmental pollution associated to the urbanization phenomenon. Starting from this analysis and diagnosis, it is possible to develop a strategic planning of the city’s growth. In this study, the reference case is Mendoza’s Metropolitan Area (MMA located in seismic and semiarid zone. The urban model presents wide road channels and different forest species along the streets in opposition to the compact city’s model. The work evaluates the impact on the (SVF) that is produced by the combination of different buildings densities (high, medium and low) and diverse magnitudes of the forest species (first, second and third); and their impact over thermal conditions in different seasons (summer and winter) of the year. A computational tool has been developed to obtain the value of the (SVF) from digital hemispherical photo image processing. The results show that if it remains constant the building density, the use of first magnitude forestalls limits the possibilities for upgrading the thermal conditions of urban canyons, during both summer and winter; showing the more favourable configuration differences in temperatures that do not exceed 2 ºC related to the worst condition.   Key words: Sky View Factor (SVF), urban canyon, building density, urban forest, seasonally thermal behaviour.