On thermally forced flows in urban street canyons
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Author(s)
Magnusson, S.
Dallman, A.
Entekhabi, D.
Britter, R.
Norford, L.
Fernando, H. J. S.
Entekhabi, Dara
Britter, Rex E.
Norford, Leslie Keith
Date Issued
April 2014
Journal
Environmental Fluid Mechanics
Publisher
Springer Netherlands
Citation
Magnusson, S. et al. “On Thermally Forced Flows in Urban Street Canyons.” Environmental Fluid Mechanics 14.6 (2014): 1427–1441.
Version
Author's final manuscript
Abstract
During sunny days with periods of low synoptic wind, buoyancy forces can play a critical role on the air flow, and thus on the dispersion of pollutants in the built urban environments. Earlier studies provide evidence that when a surface inside an urban street canyon is at a higher temperature than that of local ambient air, buoyancy forces can modify the mechanically-induced circulation within the canyons (i.e., gaps between buildings). The aspect ratio of the urban canyon is a critical factor in the manifestation of the buoyancy parameter. In this paper, computational fluid dynamics simulations are performed on urban street canyons with six different aspect ratios, focusing on the special case where the leeward wall is at a greater temperature than local ambient air. A non-dimensional measure of the influence of buoyancy is used to predict demarcations between the flow regimes. Simulations are performed under a range of buoyancy conditions, including beyond those of previous studies. Observations from a field experiment and a wind tunnel experiment are used to validate the results.
MIT Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Architecture
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Urban Studies and Planning
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Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike
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DOI of Published Version
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10652-014-9353-4
