Climate of Cyberia

This page is majorly about the climate in Cyberian cities. For elsewhere, see Climate of Antarctica.

The climate of Cyberia is a range between two points that relatively steeply shifts from one to the other at the outskirts of city limits. Outside the realm of cities, the Antarctic landscape and climate remains the one of the driest and coldest on the planet, with humidity being extremely low, and air temperatures ranging from a record high of 17.5°C (63.5°F) to an extreme frigid freeze of -89.2°C (-128.6°F). When indoors, humidity and temperature is often regulated by certain building codes to a more comfortable and hospitable level for the average citizen. There are also a number of phenomena that have arisen as possibly caused by these building regulations.

Sympathetic Heating and Humidification

Tha vast majority of public, person-occupied interiors in the Antarctic State are, as required by law, heated to between 15.5°C (60°F) and 21.1°C (70°F), and are humidified through their HVAC systems to roughly 65% relative humidity (10 g/m³ absolute) or more. It is perhaps due to this, that there exists a phenomenon of sympathetic heating and humidification in cities, outside of interiors, especially in areas of increased population density. Exterior atmospheres affected by SHH tend to trend towards but not quite equal interior atmospheres.

Sympathetic heating and humidification (SHH) is the marked and noticeable net increase in temperature and humidity that is not confined to occupied interiors. Spaces outside and between buildings are not actively heated, nor are they actively humidified in most if not all areas. However, exterior air is subjected to near constant mixing with interior atmospheres due to opening doorways and other exposing of interior controlled climates, which often causes climate controlled air to rush out into the lower pressure and lower temperature outside air.

Sympathetic heating and humidification is observed to only occur in major cities, and to a lesser extent, minor ones as well. The phenomenon of SHH only appears in areas of high population density coupled with high structure density, which is excluding the outskirts of cities due to those areas being bordered by bare Antarctic conditions. There are no definite borders between areas affected by SHH and those that are simply subjected to polar climates, however observations conducted by the Department of Infrastructure show that there is a steady increase in temperature and humidity the closer to city centers measurements are taken, and that there are irregularly-shaped areas of increased temperature and humidity that coincide with spikes in population and structural densities.

Other Factors

It has been suggested that the very high number of internal-combustion vehicles in use in the cities also contributes somewhat to SHH.

Effects

Effects of SHH manifest in the form of some exterior places being comfortable or otherwise relatively hospitable to the average citizen without much bundling of clothing. This is in stark contrast to city outskirts and areas between cities, as the temperatures experienced there can and will cause frostbite to the unprotected in less than fifteen minutes at best.

SHH can also result in an increase in snowfall due to water vapor lingering and ascending into the troposphere. This increase in snowfall happens all over cities in question, due to warmer, more humid air tending to spread out over colder outskirts. In extreme cases, this can result in cold rainfall as opposed to snow, as is the case in certain parts of Overcast, where skyscrapers that extend above cloud line are placed very close to one another.