Humans have changed the planet so permanently and dramatically, scientists had to coin a special geological name—the anthropocene—just to describe it. And you might not realize it, but the weather patterns you live with everyday are a direct product of our busy urban cores. Yes, we’ve even altered the way weather moves around the atmosphere.
The shape of our buildings and streets dramatically change the weather in cities, say the authors of a study in the journal Boundary Layer Meteorology from École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne. In their study, environmental scientists Marco Giometto and Andreas Christen ran simulations on a 3-D model of Basel, Switzerland, to show how the shape of buildings create atmospheric turbulence and suck up heat and pollution into the air. Using "large-eddy simulations," which model how wind moves around buildings, they were able to develop a more nuanced picture of what really happens to storms and wind when it blows over the urban fabric. Our current weather models are incredibly crude in comparison, and often deeply wrong.
Full article: http://www.fastcodesign.com/3060026/evidence/how-the-shape-of-your-city-determines-the-weather
The shape of our buildings and streets dramatically change the weather in cities, say the authors of a study in the journal Boundary Layer Meteorology from École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne. In their study, environmental scientists Marco Giometto and Andreas Christen ran simulations on a 3-D model of Basel, Switzerland, to show how the shape of buildings create atmospheric turbulence and suck up heat and pollution into the air. Using "large-eddy simulations," which model how wind moves around buildings, they were able to develop a more nuanced picture of what really happens to storms and wind when it blows over the urban fabric. Our current weather models are incredibly crude in comparison, and often deeply wrong.
Full article: http://www.fastcodesign.com/3060026/evidence/how-the-shape-of-your-city-determines-the-weather
