Análise de variáveis climáticas em uma cidade de clima quente e seco no nordeste brasileiro: estudo sobre conforto térmico durante os principais eventos festivos em Caicó/RN.

Abstract

In the evaluation of thermal comfort in environments, it is not enough to evaluate the conditions of comfort for the body as a whole, because there is a need to also analyze the conditions of local thermal discomfort. In urban environments, such as city centers, where there is a greater agglomeration of people performing different activities, the analysis of conditions of local thermal discomfort becomes even more necessary. In the present work denominated analysis of climatic variables in a city of hot and dry climate of the Brazilian Northeast: study on thermal comfort during the main festive events in Caicó/RN. Conditions of local thermal (de)comfort were analyzed, where the objective was to show, through bioclimatic indexes, the conditions of thermal comfort/discomfort to which the residents and tourists are submitted during the festive periods (feast of Sant'Ana and Carnival) in the center of the city of Caicó/RN, in the months of July/2016 and February/2017, respectively. Observing the field measurements and analysis of the distribution of air temperatures and relative humidity at three different points in the city center. The choice of this study area arose from the precarious diversity of studies on heat islands and the scarce studies on thermal comfort in a region of hot and dry climate, in order to get more information and observe how much the population of Caicó/RN is exposed to thermal (de)comfort in the city center, due to the process of urbanization imposed from the 1930s with the arrival of cotton culture in the region of Seridó Potiguar. A bibliographic survey on the subject was necessary in several areas, in order to apply the work methodology, which consisted of calibration, installation of the automatic datalogger thermohygrometers Akso AK170 and marking of three different points in the city center, called P1, P2 and P3, through the use of GPS. Then, equipment collection, analysis of climatic elements and finally, analysis of thermal discomfort indexes and effective temperature index. In order to determine the most comfortable and uncomfortable places in the center of the city of Caicó-RN, a place that has the most densely urbanized area. Bringing different results between each one of the points. The behavior of the maximum and minimum temperatures during the studied period followed the pattern of the climatic type of the region, that is, higher temperatures in the period of the month of July, where occurs in Caicó the Feast of Sant'Ana (winter) and lower in the period of Carnival (summer). The results also show that the difference in air temperature between the three points evaluated in the month of July (month of the feast of Sant'Ana), indicated the existence of islands of heat. From the results of the two indices applied (ID and TE), it was possible to affirm in a general way, that in the two seasons of the years in question, the center of the city of Caicó/RN was inside an area of thermal discomfort and the variations of the bioclimatic indices were very small between the months referring to the festive events. Thus, it is correct to say that the city center was in a state of high thermal discomfort due to heat, regardless of the time in question.