The International Urban Energy Balance Models Comparison Project: First results from phase 1

Evaluation is based on a dataset containing net all-wave radiation, sensible heat, and latent heat flux observations for an industrial area in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. The aim of the comparison is twofold: to identify those modeling approaches that minimize the errors in the simulated fluxes of the urban energy balance and to determine the degree of model complexity required for accurate simulations. There is evidence that some classes of models perform better for individual fluxes but no model performs best or worst for all fluxes.

In general, the simpler models perform as well as the more complex models based on all statistical measures. Generally the schemes have best overall capability to model net all-wave radiation and least capability to model latent heat flux.