Quantification of the Influences of Wind and Cloud on the Nocturnal Urban Heat Island of a Large City

Abstract Analyses taken over all observed weather conditions of daily 0600 EST climate data from a network of monitoring stations in and around the large city of Melbourne, Australia, revealed a 20-yr mean urban heat island (UHI) value of 1.13°C. The UHI varied seasonally between summer (1.29°C), spring (1.25°C), autumn (1.02°C), and winter (0.98°C). Investigations undertaken with daily wind speed and cloud amount data enabled a detailed investigation of the relative importance of factors such as the turbulent and radiative exchanges on Melbourne’s UHI. Analysis of variance and regression techniques were used to explore these processes and to predict the behavior of the UHI in numerical terms for mean seasonal and annual periods between 1972 and 1991. Over the 20-yr period, analyses of the association among Melbourne’s UHI, wind, and cloud revealed that the UHI was inversely proportional to approximately the fourth root of both the wind speed and the cloud amount. This relationship explained more of the U...

[1]  H. Ueda,et al.  An observational study of the structure of the nocturnal urban boundary layer , 1988 .

[2]  T. Gustavsson.  A study of air and road‐surface temperature variations during clear windy nights , 1995 .

[3]  Bernice Ackerman.  Temporal March of the Chicago Heat Island , 1985 .

[4]  Chow Shun Djen.  The urban climate of Shanghai , 1992 .

[5]  J. F. Clarke,et al.  Evolution of the Nocturnal Inversion Layer at an Urban and Nonurban Location , 1985 .

[6]  Y. Goldreich,et al.  The Structure of the Ground-Level Heat Island in a Central Business District , 1985 .

[7]  R. Bornstein,et al.  Urban-rural wind velocity differences , 1977 .

[8]  T. Oke.  City size and the urban heat island , 1973 .

[9]  A. C. F. Trevitt,et al.  THE DEVELOPMENT OF COMPOSITE TEMPERATURE RECORDS , 1996 .

[10]  D. O. Lee.  RURAL ATMOSPHERIC STABILITY AND THE INTENSITY OF LONDON'S HEAT ISLAND , 1975 .

[11]  M. Moreno-García,et al.  Intensity and form of the urban heat island in barcelona , 1994 .

[12]  B. Holmer,et al.  Urban Heat Island Circulation in Göteborg, Sweden , 1990 .

[13]  R. Balling,et al.  Analysis of the Kuwait city urban heat island , 1990 .

[14]  Nicolás A Mazzeo,et al.  Urban-rural temperature differences in Buenos Aires , 1998 .

[15]  Ian Simmonds,et al.  Associations between varying magnitudes of the urban heat island and the synoptic climatology in Melbourne, Australia , 2000 .

[16]  S. Kidder,et al.  The Effect of Clouds and Wind on the Difference in Nocturnal Cooling Rates between Urban and Rural Areas , 1995 .

[17]  Jay L. Devore,et al.  Probability and statistics for engineering and the sciences , 1982 .