Skyscrapers don’t just reshape a city’s skyline; they may also shape the sky itself.
Nighttime satellite observations show that 44 major U.S. cities have more cloud cover over their urban areas than over nearby rural land, researchers report February 5 in Nature Communications. Computer simulations indicate that building height and density matter.
“To make precipitation, you need to have clouds,” said Qi Li, an atmospheric scientist at Peking University in China. Clouds influence not only rainfall distribution but also a city’s heat retention after sunset and rooftop solar panel effectiveness.
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