Anthropogenic heat fluxes in urban agglomerations and their impact on meteorological processes

Abstract

One of the main factors of the impact of urbanization on mesoscale atmospheric and climatic processes are the anthropogenic heat fluxes (AHFs) caused by all types of heat sources in urban areas - from industry to metabolism in residents. A calculation of the influence of energy consumption in urban weather and climate made by the COSMO-CLM model with the TERRA-URB scheme shows that anthropogenic heat fluxes have a noticeable effect on urban temperature and wind regime. In Moscow's agglomeration, the AHF contribution results in an increase of the mean annual temperature by 2C and of the mean annual wind speed by more than 1 m/s, while the prevailing wind direction changes only slightly.