Atmosphere (Aug 2020)

Analysis of Cooling and Humidification Effects of Different Coverage Types in Small Green Spaces (SGS) in the Context of Urban Homogenization: A Case of HAU Campus Green Spaces in Summer in Zhengzhou, China

  • Huawei Li,
  • Handong Meng,
  • Ruizhen He,
  • Yakai Lei,
  • Yuchen Guo,
  • Amoako-atta Ernest,
  • Sandor Jombach,
  • Guohang Tian

DOI
https://doi.org/10.3390/atmos11080862
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 11, no. 8
p. 862

Abstract

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In the context of global warming, more and more cities are experiencing extreme Urban Heat Island (UHI) effects and extreme weather phenomena, but urban green spaces are proven to mitigate UHI. Most of UHI’s research focuses on the large scale and uses remote sensing methods, which do not reflect the dynamic characteristics in detail and do not detect internal influencing factors of the green space cooling effect. Therefore, this study focused on Small Green Spaces (SGS), carrying out the measurement of the meteorological parameters (temperature, relative humidity, wind direction, wind speed, photosynthetic radiation) of the 16 sites in four types of coverage (Impervious surface; Shrub-grass; Tree-grass; Tree-shrub-grass) in a university campus. At the same time, the coverage characteristic parameters, such as Canopy Density (CD), Leaf Area Index (LAI), Photosynthetically Active Radiation (PAR), Mean Leaf Angle (MLA), of each plot were analyzed and compared. The results showed that there were significant differences in temperature among different coverage types in SGS. The biggest difference was concentrated in the noon period when solar radiation is strongest during the day. The difference between the four types of coverage with vegetation at night was small. The maximum air temperature difference among the four types could reach 8.9 ℃ and the maximum relative humidity difference was 28.5%. The cooling effect of the multi-layer vegetation-covered (Tree-shrub-grass) area was the largest compared to the impervious surface, indicating that tree cover was the core factor affecting the temperature. Temperature and relative humidity had a close correlation with surface coverage types and some plant community characteristics (such as CD and LAI). The cooling and humidifying effects of plants were also related to PAR and leaf angle. The results provide suggestions for green space management and landscape design.

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