Analysis of Climatic Comfortability and Its Impact Factors for the Urban Human Settlement in Enshi Prefecture

Based on the observed data from 8 national meteorological stations in Enshi Prefecture from 1960 to 2021, this paper analyzes the climatic comfortability of human settlement by using statistical methods such as cumulative anomaly, linear trend estimation and correlation.The results shows that Enshi Prefecture has the highest number of comfortable days (46.9%), followed by cold days (31.9%), and a few hot and very hot days (5.6% and 0.49%, respectively), making it suitable for human habitation from the climatic perspective.In addition, Enshi is featured with superior summer getaway resources.In Lichuan and Xianfeng, the temperature is comfortable for over 87.0% of the summer, making them suitable for summer travel and health care.Comfortable days in other cities are mainly from late spring to early summer (May to June) and in early autumn (September to October), and the number of comfortable days exceeds 25.0 per month from May to June and in September throughout the whole Prefecture.The number of days with different comfortable levels is closely related to altitude and terrain.Since the 1960s, the number of comfortable days has increased and the number of cold days has decreased in Lichuan, while in other parts of the Prefecture, the numbers of both comfortable days and days with changing comfortability have decreased, accompanied with inreasing cold days (Enshi City has experienced the most dramatic change).The obvious increase of temperature and wind speed in the 1990s led to sudden changes in the numbers of comfortable days, cold days and days with changing comfortability in Enshi City.The significant decrease in wind speed in the 1980s and the significant increase in temperature after 2000 led to sudden changes in the numbers of comfortable and cold days in Lichuan around the 1980s and 2000, respectively.In conclusion, since Enshi Prefecture has a long comfortable period and abundant climate resources for summer getaway, they can be fully utilized to transform ecological resources into health and tourism economy.