Urban features at neighbourhood scale to assess and mitigate the heat island in arid Mendoza, Argentina

MARÍA BELÉN SOSA; ERICA CORREA; MICHELE ZINZI

Countermeasures to Urban Heat Islands (IC2UHI) 2019

International Institute of Information Technology

Lugar: Hyderabad; Año: 2022; p. 46 - 56

In arid and hot climate cities, urban heat island (UHI) phenomenon reductions represent a major challenge. Nowadays, climate-sensitive urban planning strategies are useful in order to reduce the UHI in arid cities. The presented study was carried out in the arid Metropolitan Mendoza Area (MMA), Argentina. The study measures the thermal improvement of apply high albedo’s roof materials and analyses its effectiveness in different neighbourhood´s layouts forms. To carry out the study, three low-density neighbourhoods that have analogous urban features but different layouts forms (multi-azimuthal, rectangular and Cul-de-Sac) were selected. Also, the downtown and four MMA´s boundaries points were assessed. The study cases were microclimate monitored, and the three neighbourhoods were modelled and adjusted with ENVI-met software. The results show that reductions in diurnal air temperatures could be achieved by using cool roofs strategy. These findings validate the researches that indicate that this UHI mitigation strategy has a higher diurnal cooling impact. Regarding the neighbourhood form, the rectangular and multi-azimuthal layouts forms remain cooler. This highlights that suitable urban planning decisions in arid cities could helps reduce the UHI phenomenon and improves the liveability of outdoor and indoor spaces.