Buildings design climate datasets for Canadian cities incorporating potential effects of climate change, urban heat island, and nature-based solutions

Canada has experienced a warming trend since the industrial revolution, surpassing the global average by a factor of two, with its northern regions experiencing an even more pronounced threefold increase in temperature. This significant and consistent shift in climate has led to extensive alterations in climate patterns nationwide, intensifying the frequency, severity, and duration of climate-related natural disasters such as floods, wildfires, and heatwaves. Canadians typically spend 90% of their time indoors in various residential, commercial, and institutional structures. Thus, enhancing the resilience of these buildings and preparing them for anticipated climate changes is crucial for maintaining the well-being of the Canadian population in the face of a changing climate. To design buildings and to assess building performance against the varying outdoor climate over their lifespan, the National Research Council Canada (NRC) has developed novel methods to prepare future projected climate datasets incorporating the effects of climate change, as well as urban heat islands. Furthermore, potential cooling which can be achieved by implementing city-scale nature-based solutions such as increased greenery and albedo, are also simulated and integrated into the climate datasets. In this paper, the approach and key aspects of aforementioned building simulation climate data will be provided. The NRC are currently using these files to incorporate climate resilience and nature-based solutions into building designs under the Government of Canada's Climate Resilient Built Environment Initiative.