Type I - LOI#L02170258 - Collaborative Research: Assessing Decadal Climate Change Impacts on Urban Populations in the Southwestern USA

在美国西南部的城市，区域变暖加上城市人口的增加以及由此产生的城市热效应正在使有限的电力和水供应紧张。在十年变暖趋势的情景下，城市可以设计得更具弹性，最大限度地减少人类影响以及能源和水的压力。然而，需要改进的微尺度气候模型，解决城市景观水文，植被动态和斑块尺度的水和能量平衡，以支持这些弹性城市系统的设计;提供资金，以创建和验证一个能够解决这些动态的建模系统。tRIBS陆面水文模型将针对城市环境进行修改，并与垂直嵌套的WRF 3.2中尺度和小气候模型耦合。该组合模型将用于测试不同的城市绿地和社区设计在气候变化情景下的水和能量平衡，灌溉水的需求和最佳应用，斑块尺度的空气温度和湿度，以及城市洪水响应的功效。这个新的耦合模型将改变城市社区的设计，使其对所有类型的十年气候变化更具适应性和弹性。本研究将证明这种方法的技术可行性，经验有效性和计算的易处理性，在凤凰城，亚利桑那州的社区作为案例研究。该模型的微气候预测将有助于预测世界各地城市社区的社区水平的人类健康和社会影响，水和能源使用，城市热岛效应和城市洪水。这项研究的潜在社会效益包括一个研究工具，可以实证验证，城市社区的定量设计，对气候变化和其他未来挑战（即水或能源短缺）更具弹性，允许优化社区，最大限度地减少水和能源的使用，减轻热岛影响，并改善社会和健康结果。这个建模工具可以通过设计使城市具有自适应性来改变城市。

In the cities of the southwestern United States, regional warming combined with increasing urban populations and the resulting urban heat effect are straining limited supplies of electricity and water. Cities can be designed that are more resilient, minimizing human impacts and energy and water stresses, under scenarios of decadal warming trends. However, improved micro-scale climate models that resolve urban landscape hydrology, vegetation dynamics and patch-scale water and energy balances are needed to support the design of these resilient urban systems; funds are provided to create and validate a modeling system capable of resolving these dynamics. The tRIBS land surface hydrology model will be modified for urban environments and coupled with the vertically nested WRF 3.2 mesoscale and microclimate model. The combined model will be used to test the efficacy of different urban green-space and neighborhood designs under climate change scenarios with respect to the water and energy balance, demand for and optimal application of irrigation water, patch-scale air temperatures and humidities, and urban flooding responses. This newly coupled model will transform the design of urban neighborhoods to be quantifiably more adaptive and resilient to all types of decadal climate change. This study will demonstrate the technical feasibility, empirical validity, and computational tractability of this approach using neighborhoods in Phoenix, AZ as case studies. The microclimate predictions of the model will be useful to predict neighborhood-level human health and social impacts, water and energy use, urban heat island effects, and urban flooding, in neighborhoods in cities around the world. The potential social benefits of this research include a research tool that can empirically validate, quantitative design of urban neighborhoods that are more resilient to climate change and other future challenges (i.e. water or energy shortages), allows the optimization of neighborhoods that minimize water and energy use, mitigate heat island impacts, and improve social and health outcomes. This modeling tool can change cities by making them adaptive by design.