Pilot Actions in European Cities – Stuttgart

The field of urban climatology has a long tradition in Stuttgart. It exists as discipline in Stuttgart since 1938. Stuttgart was the first city to establish its own Department of Climatology to research ways of improving the flow of fresh air into the city and to reduce thermal stress in most populated city districts. The specialist department of Urban Climatology, within the Environmental Protection Office, deals with tasks relating to environmental meteorology within the scope of air pollution control and also relating to urban and global climate protection. So in Stuttgart the urban heat island phenomenon (UHI) is studied for several decades, leading to a high level understanding of the UHI and the problems which it causes. The UHI causes an increase in air temperatures and thermal stress, that are identified as most negative impacts on human health and urban living. In the view of global climate change and the predicted temperature rise for the Stuttgart region of 1.5–2 K in this century, the negative impacts of UHI on human health and urban living will become more problematic in the future. According to the results of climate models the frequency of very hot days is expected to jump by nearly 30 % at the end of the century. The rising temperatures due to the global climate change in combination with the temperature shift as a result of the UHI will intensify the heat stress in urban areas, that leads to a significant increasing risk to human health, in particular to the very young and elderly. Not least due its importance for the human health and the quality of urban life in Stuttgart, the UHI is focussed by urban planners and is noticed by the future development of the city.