UrbanAIR Digital Twin: Building the Backbone with STFC and DAFNI

By Dr Jens Jensen, Scientific Computing, STFC

We were pleased to learn that the UrbanAIR proposal, submitted by TU Delft on behalf of the consortium, was selected for funding under Horizon Europe. The project aims to support cities in managing air pollution, heat stress, and urban climate risks using high-resolution digital twins.

How STFC and DAFNI are supporting UrbanAIR

Our team at DAFNI and STFC Scientific Computing’s Computational Engineering group is working with the consortium to develop an urban model across five European cities. UrbanAIR will help cities respond to air pollution, heat stress, and broader climate challenges.

Our role in the project is to combine physics-based modelling for air quality and heat into a digital twin that will be integrated with the European Space Agency’s (ESA’s) Destination Earth platform. The goal is to provide decision-support tools that enable resilient modelling and informed investment planning in urban environments.

Through close collaboration with city partners and technical experts, UrbanAIR supports practical climate adaptation using real-time data and user-centred tools. 

Laying the foundations for the digital twin

Our first major contribution, due at the end of 2025, will be to advise the partnership on the digital twin build.  This will require an extensive review of the models and datasets that already exist and, in some cases, the development of workflows needed to integrate all aspects of the digital twin.

Helping cities make smarter climate decisions

At DAFNI, we are already supporting digital twins such as CReDO.  While there are many interpretations of what a digital twin is, the Centre of Digital Built Britain describes it as:

‘Digital twins are realistic digital representations of physical assets, for example, a digital representation of an aeroplane that can be used to monitor and predict performance, feeding out insights and interventions.’

This closely reflects how a digital twin mirrors a real asset—or in this case, a city.

UrbanAIR focuses on scaling up climate modelling by leveraging Destination Earth, a global digital twin of the planet, and applying it to street-level meteorological models.

Unlike traditional climate models, this tool will provide localised, real-time insights, empowering cities to make targeted and effective decisions to address extreme heat and air quality issues.

We look forward to sharing more updates later this year and plan to offer a demonstration of what the twin can deliver. Read more at:

https://www.sc.stfc.ac.uk | https://www.dafni.ac.uk