Improve human thermal comfort through spatial climate adaptation

Global mean surface temperature is expected to increase between 2.6°C to 4.8°C until 2100 (IPCC, 2014). Global Climate Models predict that urbanization and energy consumption will increase warming and extreme heat events. Therefore, a temperature increase will lead to human thermal discomfort, health problems and decrease of water resources. What are we doing to cope with these issues? The implementation of green and blue measures is the solution to mitigate the negative impact of heat on outdoor human thermal comfort in urban areas. Likewise, the implementation of these measures needs quantification as well. Physical models (such as Town Energy Balance) are used as valuable tools to simulate the urban climate conditions and assess the effectiveness of adaptation measures such as green areas, green roofs, white roofs, water on the roads and white roofs. This study shows that these measures can decrease air temperature up to 2oC improve thermal comfort in urban areas such as Rotterdam.