Browsing by Subject "Säteily"

Air temperatures are commonly higher in urban environments compared to rural ones. The energy input of solar radiation and its storage in urban surfaces changes the way the surface interacts with the atmosphere through turbulent fluxes and mixing processes. The complexity of radiative properties combined with the effect of urban geometry makes the magnitude of the effect radiation has on the dynamics of boundary layer flow an important area of study. The aim of this study is to understand and quantify how much the radiative processes alter the flow field and turbulence in a real urban street canyon in Helsinki. The model used is the large-eddy simulation (LES) model PALM, which solves for the flow and the most relevant atmospheric scales that describe interactions between the surface and atmosphere. An additional library called RRTMG (Rapid Radiative Transfer Model for Global Models) is used in this study to provide the radiation input impacting the boundary layer flow. Two embedded surface models in PALM, USM (Urban Surface Model) and LSM (Land-Surface Model) are used to solve the local conditions for radiative balance based on the output of RRTMG. Two model runs are made (RRTMG On & RRTMG Off), both identical in terms of the large-scale forcing boundary conditions and land-use data, but with additional radiation input in RRTMG On. The results show that radiation alters the low level stratification of potential temperature, which leads to more unstable conditions. Near-surface air temperatures within the canyon were increased by 3.9 C on average. Horizontal wind speeds increased by 76 % close to the ground compared to RRTMG Off. RRTMG On also showed a change in the structure of the topographically forced canyon vortex, as the low wind conditions enabled the radiative effects to have a stronger effect in its forcing. The center of the vortex changed in location more towards the center of the canyon and the vertical motions on opposing sides of the street were strengthened by 0.15 m/s in both vertical directions. Additionally both mechanical and thermal turbulence production increased with RRTMG On, while the thermal production remained smaller by one magnitude compared to mechanical production within Mäkelänkatu. Higher wind speeds and their variance gave rise to increased mechanical production of turbulence and radiative effects increased the thermal production. More research is however needed to determine thermal turbulence's role in situations with different meteorological conditions or in other cities.