Understanding Microclimate Analysis
Microclimate analysis provides a way to quickly, easily, and accurately evaluate the thermal comfort of outdoor spaces. It combines the sun, wind, and sky exposure, and numerous localized weather and climate data to create a comprehensive microclimate map of your site.
What is Outdoor Thermal Comfort?
Why Outdoor Thermal Comfort Matters
- Human health and safety
- Extreme heat can cause heat stress, dehydration, and even heatstroke
- Vulnerable groups (elderly, children) are especially at risk
- Comfortable environments reduce physical strain and health risks
- Use of public spaces
- People are more likely to spend time outdoors when conditions are comfortable
- Affects how parks, plazas, and streets are used
- Encourages walking, cycling, and social interaction
- Urban livability
- Comfortable outdoor areas improve quality of life in cities
- Supports vibrant public life and community engagement
- Makes cities more attractive and inclusive
- Energy consumption
- Poor outdoor comfort often leads to higher indoor cooling demand
- Well-designed outdoor spaces can reduce reliance on air conditioning
- Economic impact
- Comfortable environments increase foot traffic in commercial areas
- Benefits local businesses, tourism, and outdoor events
Urban Heat Island Effect
Microclimate Analysis in Forma Site Design
- Uses UTCI (perceived “feels like” temperature)
- Combines multiple environmental inputs into a single metric
- Key Inputs
- Direct solar radiation (sun analysis)
- Indirect radiation / sky exposure (daylight analysis)
- Wind conditions (wind analysis)
- If detailed wind analysis is not yet computed, a constant wind speed is assumed based on weather data
- Weather data
- Air temperature, humidity, cloud cover
- Data & Performance
- ERA5 climate dataset (historical weather data)
- Global Wind Atlas (wind direction + frequency)
- Based on multi-year data (2013–2020)
- Runs in approximately ~1 minute without wind results, 40-200 min with wind results
- Accuracy
- Results validated against industry tools and standards
- Limitations
- Does not include:
- Surface materials
- Ground properties
- Evapotranspiration
Workflow — Running a Microclimate Analysis
- Open a proposal.
- In the right panel, go to Analyze → Microclimate Analysis.
- In the analysis area menu at the top of the right panel, select the analysis area
- Adjust the analysis radius.
- Click Run analysis to start.
- Repeat this process for each proposal you want to compare.
Exploring and Interpreting the Microclimate Analysis Results
Example: Comparing Microclimate Analysis Results
Additional Resources
To learn more about the features of Microclimate analysis and the feedback available, read this article:
- Introduction to Microclimate Analysis