Atmospheric Measurements and Modelling

This module provides in-depth educational training on the principles of measurement and modelling techniques with a focus on urban environments. Through various activities, the students will gain significant hands-on experience in conducting field experiments and performing numerical simulations.

In collaboration with ethics experts from the TPM faculty, the instructors of the AEE track will organize a half-day long workshop on ethics. The theme of the workshop will be on ethical issues related to Open Science. The students will actively participate and prepare a reflection document as part of a portfolio. During Q6, this portfolio will be evaluated by ethics experts.

Atmospheric Measurement Techniques for Urban Environments

This module theme covers the fundamentals of observational techniques for atmospheric processes with an emphasis on urban environments and high spatial/temporal resolutions.

The following topics will be addressed:

• Importance of collecting data

• Difficulties encountered in urban environments

• General overview of different types of measurement techniques including Doppler and polarimetry

• Basic concepts: wavelength, scattering, absorption, propagation

• Basic definitions and concepts: scale, coverage, temporal/spatial resolution, accuracy, precision etc.

• Rain gauges, Radar, Turbulent flux measurements of momentum, heat and moisture and chemical species, Lidar, Sodar, Radiometers,

• Accuracy, precision, calibration

• Noise measurements in the field, analysis of measured data and filtering

• Quality control, noise, bias, uncertainties and errors.

• Missing values

• Sensor placement, good practices etc.

• Citizen weather stations

• Microwave links, smartphones.

• User engagement and awareness.

Modelling of Urban Flows

Content module theme:

The module theme focuses on the fundamentals of Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) tailored for urban environments. The course will introduce the governing equations first and elaborate on the mathematical methods applied to model the flow around buildings. Real world examples will be used to show direct application of CFD during computer labs, and students will have hands-on practice to learn and use CFD in urban areas.

The following topics will be addressed:

• Governing equations

• Reynolds decomposition and averaging

• Discretization of governing equations (finite-difference, finite-volume, finite-element approaches)

• Time-marching methods

• Stability, accuracy, convergence

• Boundary conditions for urban environments

• Mesh and complex geometries generation

• Turbulence modelling (RANS/LES/DNS)

• Introduction to uncertainty quantification