Initial results from Phase 2 of the international urban energy balance model comparison

Grimmond, C. S. B. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3166-9415, Blackett, M., Best, M. J., Baik, J. J., Belcher, S. E., Beringer, J., Bohnenstengel, S. I., Calmet, I., Chen, F., Coutts, A., Dandou, A., Fortuniak, K., Gouvea, M. L., Hamdi, R., Hendry, M., Kanda, M., Kawai, T., Kawamoto, Y., Kondo, H., Krayenhoff, E. S., Lee, S. H., Loridan, T., Martilli, A., Masson, V., Miao, S., Oleson, K., Ooka, R., Pigeon, G., Porson, A., Ryu, Y. H., Salamanca, F., Steeneveld, G. J., Tombrou, M., Voogt, J. A., Young, D.T. and Zhang, N. (2011) Initial results from Phase 2 of the international urban energy balance model comparison. International Journal of Climatology, 31 (2). pp. 244-272. ISSN 1097-0088 doi: 10.1002/joc.2227

Abstract/Summary

Urban land surface schemes have been developed to model the distinct features of the urban surface and the associated energy exchange processes. These models have been developed for a range of purposes and make different assumptions related to the inclusion and representation of the relevant processes. Here, the first results of Phase 2 from an international comparison project to evaluate 32 urban land surface schemes are presented. This is the first large-scale systematic evaluation of these models. In four stages, participants were given increasingly detailed information about an urban site for which urban fluxes were directly observed. At each stage, each group returned their models' calculated surface energy balance fluxes. Wide variations are evident in the performance of the models for individual fluxes. No individual model performs best for all fluxes. Providing additional information about the surface generally results in better performance. However, there is clear evidence that poor choice of parameter values can cause a large drop in performance for models that otherwise perform well. As many models do not perform well across all fluxes, there is need for caution in their application, and users should be aware of the implications for applications and decision making.

Additional Information	Special issue: ICUC-7 urban climate meeting
Item Type	Article
URI	https://reading-clone.eprints-hosting.org/id/eprint/8148
Identification Number/DOI	10.1002/joc.2227
Refereed	Yes
Divisions	Science > School of Mathematical, Physical and Computational Sciences > Department of Meteorology
Uncontrolled Keywords	urban climate;energy balance;surface atmosphere exchanges;land surface modelling;sustainable cities;radiation;turbulent heat fluxes;evaporation
Additional Information	Special issue: ICUC-7 urban climate meeting
Publisher	John Wiley
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