Development and application of an urban typology database and QGIS plugin for the SUEWS model

作者：Oskar Bäcklin, Fredrik Lindberg, Ting Sun, Sue Grimmond, Helen C. Ward, Leena Järvi, Denise Hertwig, Junxia Dou, Xiaoxiong Xie, Yiqing Liu · 年份：2025 · DOI：10.5194/icuc12-734 · 被引用次数：1 · 研究领域：Remote Sensing and Land Use

The Surface Urban Energy and Water Balance Scheme (SUEWS) is a widely used model in urban climate modelling, addressing numerous urban climatic challenges. Due to the complexity and wide range of physical processes being modelled, properly setting up the model for a specific site can be difficult. A user may have extensive knowledge of building energy but limited understanding of phenology, leading to the use of vegetation parameters that are not suited for the modelled domain.Urban areas are heterogeneous and complex environments characterised by high variability in geometry, land use, surface materials, vegetation, and anthropogenic activity. Many NWP models utilise a grid-based approach to model energy fluxes, even though grids do not necessarily reflect the actual structure of cities. Within these grids, there is significant variability in building height, age, function, form, and materials, making proper parameterisation challenging.To make it easier for users to choose relevant parameters, the new SUEWS property database has been developed. This database provides evidence-based parameter entries for different geographical contexts. Located within Urban Multi-scale Environmental Predictor (UMEP) toolbox in QGIS, it allows users to investigate and add parameters. A new SUEWS prepare QGIS plugin has also been developed, utilising urban typologies that represent certain properties for specific urban neighbourhoods. These typologies enable the swift calculation of urban char...