Urban Climate in Asia  

Urban Climate of Asia

For about 30 to 50 years, urban development has been taking place in mid and high latitude regions of United States and Europe which was in line with economic growth. More recently, Asian countries particularly Southeast Asia, also saw rapid development of urban areas due to economic prosperity. Previous studies have shown that the effects of cities vary with urban form and climate. For example, Doan et al. (2020) showed that urbanization increases precipitation even in tropical regions cities with active large-flow activity, such as Singapore.

Kusaka Laboratory is currently conducting research on Asian "megacities" such as Jakarta (Indonesia), Bangkok (Thailand), Manila (Philippines), Ho Chi Minh City (Vietnam), and Singapore. In addition to evaluating urban effects with and without cities, Kusaka Laboratory also compares current and past urban climates using historical land use data. These evaluations enable the examination of climate change and projections of future urbanization based on urban development master plan.

Some of the studies are conducted in collaboration with the National Meteorological Agency of Vietnam (NCHMF) and the Agency of Meteorology, Climatology, and Geophysics of the republic of Indonesia (BMKG). We put great effort into these studies, meeting regularly to share information.

The Kusaka Laboratory also has international students from China, Vietnam, the Philippines, Malaysia and Sri Lanka who are conducting urban climate researches based on their home countries. Thus, making urban climate the hottest research topics in Kusaka Laboratory at the moment.

List of journals by city studied so far

Tokyo (Japan)

• Hiroyuki Kusaka, Keiko Nawata, Asuka Suzuki-Parker, Yuya Takane, Nana Furuhashi (2014):
  Mechanism of Precipitation Increase with Urbanization in Tokyo as Revealed by Ensemble Climate   Simulations

• Sachiho A. Adachi, Fuji Kimura, Hiroyuki Kusaka, Michael G. Duda, Yoshiki Yamagata, Hajime Seya, Kumiko Nakamichi, Toshinori Aoyagi (2014):
  Moderation of Summertime Heat Island Phenomena via Modification of the Urban Form in the Tokyo Metropolitan Area

• Asuka Suzuki-Parker, Hiroyuki Kusaka, Yoshiki Yamagata (2015):

Assessment of the Impact of Metropolitan-Scale Urban Planning Scenarios on the Moist Thermal Environment under Global Warming: A Study of the Tokyo Metropolitan Area Using Regional Climate Modeling

• Asuka Suzuki-Parker, Hiroyuki Kusaka (2016):

Future projections of labor hours based on WBGT for Tokyo and Osaka, Japan, using multi-period ensemble dynamical downscale simulations

• Hiroyuki Kusaka, Asuka Suzuki-Parker, Toshinori Aoyagi, Sachiho A. Adachi, Yoshiki Yamagata (2016):

Assessment of RCM and urban scenarios uncertainties in the climate projections for August in the 2050s in Tokyo

• Hiroyuki Kusaka, Akifumi Nishi, Mayumi Mizunari, Hitoshi Yokoyama (2019):

Urban impacts on the spatiotemporal pattern of short-duration convective precipitation in a coastal city adjacent to a mountain range

• Quang‐Van Doan, Fei Chen, Yuki Asano, Ying Gu, Akifumi Nishi, Hiroyuki Kusaka, Dev Niyogi (2022):

Causes for asymmetric warming of sub‐diurnal temperature responding to global warming

• Quang‐Van Doan, Fei Chen, Hiroyuki Kusaka, Jie Wang, Mizuo Kajino, Tetsuya Takemi (2022):

Identifying a new normal in extreme precipitation at a city scale under warmer climate regimes: A case study of the Tokyo metropolitan area, Japan

Sendai (Japan)

• Lidia Lazarova Vitanova, Hiroyuki Kusaka, Van Quang Doan, Akifumi Nishi (2019): 

Numerical Study of the Urban Heat Island in Sendai City with Potential Natural Vegetation and the 1850s and 2000s Land-Use Data

Shanghai (China)

• Ying Gu, Hiroyuki Kusaka, Van Quang Doan, Jianguo Tan (2019):

Impacts of urban expansion on fog types in Shanghai, China: Numerical experiments by WRF model

• Ying Gu, Hiroyuki Kusaka, Quang-Van Doan (2023):

An advection fog event response to future climate forcing in the 2030s–2080s: a case study for Shanghai

Ho Chi Minh (Vietnam)

• Quang-Van Doan, Hiroyuki Kusaka (2016):

Numerical study on regional climate change due to the rapid urbanization of greater Ho Chi Minh City's metropolitan area over the past 20 years

• Quang-Van Doan, Hiroyuki Kusaka, Quoc-Bang Ho (2016):

Impact of future urbanization on temperature and thermal comfort index in a developing tropical city: Ho Chi Minh City

• Tran Ngoc Dang, Doan Quang Van, Hiroyuki Kusaka, Xerxes T Seposo, Yasushi Honda (2018):

Green Space and Deaths Attributable to the Urban Heat Island Effect in Ho Chi Minh City

• Doan, Quang Van, Kusaka, Hiroyuki (2018):

Projections of Urban Climate in the 2050s in a Fast-Growing City in Southeast Asia: the Greater Ho Chi Minh City Metropolitan Area, Vietnam

Hanoi (Vietna)

• Van Q. Doan, Hiroyuki Kusaka, Truong M. Nguyen (2019):

Roles of past, present, and future land use and anthropogenic heat release changes on urban heat island effects in Hanoi, Vietnam: Numerical experiments with a regional climate model

Singapore

• Quang‐Van Doan, Anurag Dipankar, Andrés Simón‐Moral, Claudio Sanchez, Venkatraman Prasanna, Matthias Roth, Xiang‐Yu Huang (2021):

Urban‐induced modifications to the diurnal cycle of rainfall over a tropical city

• Doan, Quang Van, Chen, Fei, Kusaka, Hiroyuki, Dipankar, Anurag, Khan, Ansar, Hamdi, Rafiq, Roth, Matthias, Niyogi, Dev (2022):

Increased Risk of Extreme Precipitation over an Urban Agglomeration with Future Global Warming

• Quang‐Van Doan, Fei Chen, Yuki Asano, Ying Gu, Akifumi Nishi, Hiroyuki Kusaka, Dev Niyogi (2022):

Causes for asymmetric warming of sub‐diurnal temperature responding to global warming

(Written by: Nobuyasu Suzuki; Edited by: Sharifah)