Urban Changes to Control and Mitigate the Urban Heat Islands (UHI): Analysis in the Catania’s Territory

Urban Heat Island (UHI) is a phenomenon whereby the centre of cities has a higher temperature than peripheral areas. If the phenomenon is not controlled there is a strong risk of worsening the quality of life of the population geographically involved. On the other hand when UHI will be fully understood it can be easily countered or even exploited to heat cities with cold climates. The aim of the study was to analyse the UHI of the Catania territory, carrying out work in phases. First of all, data from the weather stations situated in the territory were collected and analysed in order to verify the presence of the phenomenon; subsequently, analyses were carried out using the UMEP urban simulation model on two samples of the Catania urban fabric located in Corso delle Province and Ognina. These two areas have been chosen because they have very different characteristics and are well representative of different types of urban fabric present in the territory of Catania; therefore, the mitigation plannings chosen for the two areas were different as well. Simulations have been carried out on both the new and the existing condition with the three sub-programmes of which UMEP is composed (SUEWS, SOLWEIG and SEBE) and the data obtained have been compared to see whether the project proposals were effective. The analysis of the results shows that the design choices for the mitigation of the UHI phenomenon in the Catania scenario mitigate temperatures and that it is therefore possible to think of extending these choices to the whole territory of Catania.