Problem: The prospect that urban heat island (UHI) effects and climate change may increase urban temperatures is a problem for cities that actively promote urban redevelopment and higher densities. One possible UHI mitigation strategy is to plant more trees and other irrigated vegetation to prevent daytime heat storage and facilitate nighttime cooling, but this requires water resources that are limited in a desert city like Phoenix.
Purpose: We investigated the tradeoffs between water use and nighttime cooling inherent in urban form and land use choices.
Methods: We used a Local-Scale Urban Meteorological Parameterization Scheme (LUMPS) model to examine the variation in temperature and evaporation in 10 census tracts in Phoenix's urban core. After validating results with estimates of outdoor water use based on tract-level city water records and satellite imagery, we used the model to simulate the temperature and water use consequences of implementing three different scenarios.
Results and conclusions: We found that increasing irrigated landscaping lowers nighttime temperatures, but this relationship is not linear; the greatest reductions occur in the least vegetated neighborhoods. A ratio of the change in water use to temperature impact reached a threshold beyond which increased outdoor water use did little to ameliorate UHI effects.
Takeaway for practice: There is no one design and landscape plan capable of addressing increasing UHI and climate effects everywhere. Any one strategy will have inconsistent results if applied across all urban landscape features and may lead to an inefficient allocation of scarce water resources.
Research Support: This work was supported by the National Science Foundation (NSF) under Grant SES-0345945 (Decision Center for a Desert City) and by the City of Phoenix Water Services Department. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of NSF.
This study addresses a classic sustainability challenge—the tradeoff between water conservation and temperature amelioration in rapidly growing cities, using Phoenix, Arizona and Portland, Oregon as case studies. An urban energy balance model— LUMPS (Local-Scale Urban Meteorological Parameterization Scheme)—is used to represent the tradeoff between outdoor water use and nighttime cooling during hot, dry summer months. Tradeoffs were characterized under three scenarios of land use change and three climate-change assumptions. Decreasing vegetation density reduced outdoor water use but sacrificed nighttime cooling. Increasing vegetated surfaces accelerated nighttime cooling, but increased outdoor water use by ~20%. Replacing impervious surfaces with buildings achieved similar improvements in nighttime cooling with minimal increases in outdoor water use; it was the most water-efficient cooling strategy. The fact that nighttime cooling rates and outdoor water use were more sensitive to land use scenarios than climate-change simulations suggested that cities can adapt to a warmer climate by manipulating land use.
While PhD dissertations are typically accessible many other terminal degree projects remain invisible and inaccessible to a greater audience. Over the past year and a half, librarians at Arizona State University collaborated with faculty and departmental administrators across a variety of fields to develop and create institutional repository collections that highlight and authoritatively share this type of student scholarship with schools, researchers, and future employers. This poster will present the benefits, challenges, and considerations required to successfully implement and manage these collections of applied final projects or capstone projects. Specifically, issues/challenges related to metadata consistency, faculty buy-in, and developing an ingest process, as well as benefits related to increased visibility and improved educational and employment opportunities will be discussed. This interactive presentation will also discuss lessons learned from the presenter’s experiences in context of how they can easily apply to benefit their respective institutions.
This presentation highlights SHARE’s ongoing initiatives as a free, open data set about research and scholarly activities across their life cycle. It includes information about the SHARE open technology and the ongoing community contributions. A variety of data set use cases and their implementation will be described to allow others to apply similar tools and techniques to their home institution or organization. SHARE aggregates free, open metadata about scholarship that includes proposals, registrations, data, publications, and more from more than 125 sources including ASU.
You’ve probably heard a lot of “futurists” talk about data, but it’s not always clear how data relate to our day to day work in libraries.
Why are data important, and what’s the big deal? Data are not just spreadsheets and numbers, but come in many different shapes, colors, and flavors! In this presentation, we will give an introduction to data, talk about why it is relevant, and demonstrate how to and use data in practical situations. We will also provide innovative examples that will inspire you to connect with your colleagues and patrons!
Digital technology has enabled us to record and share our memories and histories faster and in greater numbers than previously imagined. However digital files rely on hardware, software, and descriptive information to be used. As formats change and equipment to read them goes out of use we are all challenged to connect our present to our future. How long do you want your digital files to last? Decades or even a few years from now will you still be able to access and enjoy those pictures, documents and other digital items you create today?
Libraries, museums and archives spend countless hours and resources preserving physical items from the past and present, but may be forfeiting the longevity of our digital work and connecting to future generations through unintended neglect. Using practical examples and employing best practices of research institutions, participants will learn important first steps to digital preservation including the importance of metadata to personal history, recommended file formats, and approaches they can immediately use to ensure the work they create today will still be enjoyed tomorrow. Help yourself, your organization, and your patrons continue to connect their digital heritage to the generations yet to come.
The Arizona State University Libraries’ fun Library Minute video series brings information about resource and services to a large student body. For the first time, we present a workshop walking through the entire production process from start to finish and offering suggestions on how to fit multimedia into your marketing and outreach strategy. In this session, we will produce a short video with participants in three steps:
1. Conceptualization and Planning.
2. Recording.
3. Editing and Distribution.
Digital Production Manger Matthew Harp will demonstrate the tools and process and elaborate on the use of social media, YouTube, and the Internet Archive in the distribution plan. Together with Mimmo Bonanni and Library Minute Host Anali Perry, we’ll share our tips and tricks for video production using whatever resources are available.
Presented at the 2011 Arizona Library Association Conference 2011 - Tucson, Arizona