Building Scale Simulation in Support of Field Experiments around Salt Lake City

Numerical modeling of the urban boundary layer is complicated by the need to describe airflow patterns outside of the computational domain. These patterns have an impact on how successfully the simulation is able to model the turbulence associated with the urban boundary layer. This talk presents experiments with the model boundary conditions for simulations that were done to support two Department of Energy observational programs involving the Salt Lake City basin. The Chemical/Biological Non-proliferation Program (CBNP) is concerned with the effects of buildings on influencing dispersion patterns in urban environments. The Vertical Transport and Mixing Program (VTMX) investigating mixing mechanisms in the stable boundary layer and how they are influenced by the channeling caused by drainage flows or by obstacles such as building complexes. Both of these programs are investigating the turbulent mixing caused by building complexes and other urban obstacles.