This research concerns a first approach to adapt the thermal comfort bands of the Physiological Equivalent Temperature (PET), New Standard Effective Temperature (SET), and Predicted Mean Vote (PMV) indices to Santa Maria's population, Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil, on the basis of the application of perception/sensation questionnaires to inhabitants while, at the same time, recording meteorological attribute data. Meteorological and thermal sensation data were collected from an automatic weather station installed on paved ground in the downtown area, which contained the following sensors: a scale gauge; a global radiation sensor; a temperature and humidity sensor; a speed and wind direction sensor; a gray globe thermometer. First of all, air temperature, gray globe temperature, relative air humidity, wind speed, wind gust, global solar radiation and precipitation were collected. People were interviewed using a questionnaire adapted from the model established by ISO 10551. The results demonstrated the efficiency of the linear regression model and the adequacy of the interpretive indexes, presenting results different from those analyzed by other authors in different climatic zones. These differences meet the analyzed literature and attest to the effectiveness of the calibration method of the PET, SET, and PMV indices for the Brazilian subtropical climate. After calibration, the PET index hit rate increased from 32.8% to 69.3%. The SET index, which had an initial hit rate of 34.6% before calibration, reached a hit-rate of 64.9%, while the PMV index increased from 35.9% to 58.7%.

This study aims to identify the relationship between changes in temperature regarding urbanization processes and seasonality in the city of São Paulo, located in the Tropic of Capricorn. The land surface temperature (LST) results were compared to official weather stations measurements, identifying in the spring–summer period 65.5% to 86.2% accuracy, while in the autumn–winter period, the results ranged from 58.6% to 93.1% accuracy, when considering the standard deviation and the temperature probe error. The mean MAE and mean RMSE range from 1.2 to 1.9 °C, with 83.0% of the values being ≤2.7 °C, and the coefficient of determination values are R = 0.81 in spring–summer and R = 0.82 in autumn–winter. Great thermal amplitude was estimated in the spring–summer season, with a difference in LST of the built-up space and rural area ranging from 5.8 and 11.5 °C, while in the autumn–winter season, the LST is more distributed through the city, with differences ranging from 4.4 to 8.5 °C. In addition, the current study suggests remote sensing as a reliable, cheap, and practical methodology to assist climate in order to support public policies and decision-making actions regarding environmental and urban planning.

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, RESUMO Atualmente, existem poucos estudos sobre a influência do vento no ambiente térmico exterior e no conforto térmico em áreas urbanas de clima subtropical. As atuações de ventos regionais típicos são de grande importância na interpretação de dados e na busca por respostas perceptivas e de sensação térmica da população. A presente pesquisa buscou por meio da análise de dados climáticos obtidos em campo, avaliar a sensação térmica e a percepção climática da população de Santa Maria-RS, sob influência do vento norte local, um vento regional típico que se caracteriza por ser quente e seco e soprar do quadrante norte em períodos de tempo pré-frontal. Para tanto, fez-se o uso de dados meteorológicos primários, a partir da instalação de uma estação meteorológica móvel no centro da cidade, bem como de dados meteorológicos secundários, provenientes da Estação Meteorológica de Santa Maria sob responsabilidade do Instituto Nacional de Meteorologia (INMET). Também foram executadas entrevistas com a população local, com a finalidade de obter as respostas perceptivas e de sensação térmica dos usuários que circulavam em ambiente urbano. Verificou-se uma influência negativa do vento norte na sensação térmica da maioria dos indivíduos entrevistados, bem como uma percepção desfavorável ao vento, o que resultou em sensação térmica de desconforto durante os dias em que as temperaturas estavam elevadas e o vento norte quente e seco mais intenso. PALAVRAS-CHAVE: conforto térmico; percepção; sensação térmica. ABSTRACTCurrently, there are few studies on the influence of wind on outdoor thermal environment and thermal comfort in subtropical climate urban areas. The performances of typical regional winds are of great importance in the interpretation of data and search for population perceptual responses and thermal sensation. This research sought, through analysis of climate data obtained in field, to assess the thermal sensation and climate perception of Santa Maria-RS population, under the influence of the local north wind, a typical regional wind that is characterized by being warm and dry and blowing from the north quadrant in prefrontal episodes. Therefore, we used primary meteorological data, from the installation of a mobile weather station at city center, as well as secondary meteorological data from Santa Maria weather station under the responsibility of the National Institute of Meteorology (INMET). Interviews were also carried out with the local population, in order to get the perceptual and thermal sensation responses of users circulating in the urban environment. There was a negative influence of the north wind in the thermal sensation of the majority of the interviewees, as well as an unfavorable perception of the wind, resulting in thermal discomfort during the days when temperatures were high and hot dry north wind more intense.

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The bioclimatic well-being of individuals is associated with the environmental characteristics of where they live. Knowing the relationships between local and regional climatic variables as well as the physical characteristics of a given region and their implications on thermal comfort is important for identifying aspects of thermal sensation in the population. The aim of this study is to develop an empirical model of human thermal comfort based on subjective and individual environmental patterns observed in the city of Santa Maria, located in the state of Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil (Subtropical climate). Meteorological data were collected by means of an automatic meteorological station installed in the city center, which contained sensors measuring global solar radiation, air temperature, globe temperature (via a grey globe thermometer), relative humidity and wind speed and direction. A total of 1720 people were also interviewed using a questionnaire adapted from the model recommended by ISO 10551. Linear regressions were performed to obtain the predictive model. The observed results proposed a new empirical model for subtropical climate, the Brazilian Subtropical Index (BSI), which was verified to be more than 79% accurate, with a coefficient of determination of 0.926 and an adjusted R2 value of 0.924.

This research concerns the identification of a pattern between the occurrence of extreme weather conditions, such as cold waves and heat waves, and hospitalization for cardiovascular diseases (CVDs), in the University Hospital of Santa Maria (HUSM) in southern Brazil between 2012 and 2017. The research employed the field experiment method to measure the biometeorological parameters associated with hospital admissions in different seasons, such as during extreme weather conditions such as a cold wave (CW) or a heat wave (HW), using five thermal comfort indices: physiologically equivalent temperature (PET), new standard effective temperature (SET), predicted mean vote (PMV), effective temperatures (ET), and effective temperature with wind (ETW). The hospitalizations were recorded as 0.775 and 0.726 admissions per day for the winter and entire study periods, respectively. The records for extreme events showed higher admission rates than those on average days. The results also suggest that emergency hospitalizations for heart diseases during extreme weather events occurred predominantly on days with thermal discomfort. Furthermore, there was a particularly high risk of hospitalization for up to seven days after the end of the CW. Further analyses showed that cardiovascular hospitalizations were higher in winter than in summer, suggesting that CWs are more life threatening in wintertime.