The effect of building height diversity on outdoor microclimate conditions in hot climate. A case study of Dubai-UAE
Date
2020
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Elsevier
Abstract
Urban geometry and buildings' morphology affect the thermal behaviour of the spatial en vironment. Urban compactness is a key variable that affects thermal performance in hot climates.
Previous studies focused on traditional methods of increasing the shading effect, e.g. buildings'
height/canyon width (H/W) ratio. This research looks at alternative methods to increase the
shading effect by changing the block's orientation and buildings' height diversity within the
urban block. ENVI-Met 4.1 software is used to predict the outdoor thermal performance of a base
case urban configuration then used to evaluate several proposed urban configurations and
compare their thermal performance to the base case configuration. Orientation was the most
influential factor in the outdoor air. For the base case, a reduction of 1.8 °C degree was noted
between the N-S and NE-SW orientations. An urban configuration with significant variation in the
buildings' height resulted in more reduction in outdoor air temperature compared to a config uration with gradual variation in the buildings' heights. Orienting the significant variation in
buildings' heights along the short axis of the urban block resulted in a reduction of the air
temperature in NW-SE orientation by 1.1 °C.
Description
Keywords
Urban geometry
Buildings height diversity
Outdoor thermal performance
ENVI-Met
Citation
Shareef, S. and Abu-Hijleh, B. (2020) “The effect of building height diversity on outdoor microclimate conditions in hot climate. A case study of Dubai-UAE,” Urban Climate, 32.