This paper aims to provide data support for rural sustainable development through analyzing the spatio-temporal characteristics of the interactions of the outdoor thermal environment. The ordinary and representative rural settlements in the Guanzhong area were selected to analyze the dynamic process of the rural thermal environment through field measurements and numerical simulations. RMSE (root mean square error) and MAPE (mean absolute percentage) were used to verify the numerical simulation model, and physiological equivalent temperature (PET) was used to evaluate the outdoor thermal environment. Results show that the ENVI-met model reliably predicts the thermal environment of a rural settlement, as the air temperature and relative humidity values range of the RMSE and MAPE were 0.85–1.79 and 2.04–5.11%, respectively. Moreover, the air temperature rose by 3.08% and relative humidity dropped by 4.42% from 2003 to 2018 as the amount of artificial surfaces increased by 35.4% and the PET index gradually increased by 27.43% at daytime and 34.03% at nighttime. Furthermore, trees could improve the outdoor thermal environment significantly, mainly because the average air temperature decreased by 3.6% and relative humidity increased by 8%, and the PET index decreased by 12.4% and 13.1%, respectively, for daytime and nighttime. This case study is representative of rural settlements in the Guanzhong plain, and thus is an appeal to rural planners to pay attention to the thermal environment issues caused by increased artificial underlay surfaces and to focus on trees in rural areas.

China has the largest number of villages in the world, and research on rural microclimate will contribute to global climate knowledge. A three-by-three grid method was developed to explore village microclimates through field measurement and ENVI-met simulation. A regression model was used to explore the mechanistic relationship between microclimate and spatial morphology, and predicted mean vote (PMV) was selected to evaluate outdoor thermal comfort. The results showed that ENVI-met was able to evaluate village microclimate, as Pearson’s correlation coefficient was greater than 0.8 and mean absolute percentage error (MAPE) was from 2.16% to 3.79%. Moreover, the air temperature of west–east road was slightly higher than that of south–north, especially in the morning. The height-to-width ratio (H/W) was the most significant factor to affect air temperature compared to percentage of building coverage (PBC) and wind speed. In addition, H/W and air temperature had a relatively strong negative correlation when H/W was between 0.52 and 0.93. PMV indicated that the downwind edge area of prevailing wind in villages was relatively comfortable. This study provides data support and a reference for optimizing village land use, mediating the living environment, and promoting rural revitalization.

Modern residential balconies have the potential to function as passive solar buffer spaces, yet their thermal performance in cold-region high-rise apartments remains insufficiently explored. This study proposes a stepwise glazing–phase change material (PCM) integrated balcony sunspace strategy for a typical high-rise residential apartment in Xi’an, China. Dynamic simulations were conducted to evaluate the effects of balcony orientation, glazing system, PCM melting temperature, and PCM thickness on indoor thermal comfort and annual heating and cooling demand. First, an open living room-connected balcony was used as the benchmark case, and five glazing systems were compared under southwest-, south-, and southeast-facing orientations. Then, based on the optimal glazing system, a 9C–PCM–9C partition wall was introduced between the enclosed balcony sunspace and the living room. The results showed that the optimal glazing system increased the annual thermal comfort ratio by 4.15–5.24 percentage points and reduced annual heating and cooling demand by 13.78–15.80 kWh/m² and 6.16–7.21 kWh/m², respectively. Further PCM integration achieved additional improvements, with 21 °C + 30 mm identified as the optimal configuration for all orientations. Compared with the glazing-only case, it increased thermal comfort by 2.05–2.50 percentage points and reduced heating and cooling demand by 4.80–5.10 kWh/m² and 1.64–1.76 kWh/m², respectively. The findings provide a practical passive design strategy for climate-responsive balcony sunspaces in cold-region residential buildings.

Under intensifying climate change and increasingly frequent extreme heat events, improving outdoor thermal environments has become critical for sustainable human settlements. While prior studies have mainly focused on urban contexts, systematic investigations of rural microclimates—particularly regarding the regulatory mechanisms of landscape configurations—remain limited. This study examines a mountain-adjacent village in the Loess Tableland region of China, integrating field measurements with ENVI-met simulations to analyze thermal characteristics of rural road spaces and the effects of vegetation and paving materials on human thermal comfort. The results show that village boundary areas experience the largest fluctuations in air temperature and relative humidity during midday and evening, indicating higher thermal sensitivity. Model validation demonstrates satisfactory accuracy, with RMSE values of 0.39–3.62 °C for air temperature, 1.32–3.22% for relative humidity, and 1.35–2.24 m/s for wind speed, and MAPE ranging from 0.80% to 9.05%. Furthermore, Basalt Brick and Populus alba show the best cooling performance, but when considering multiple factors such as temperature, humidity, and wind speed, Ligustrum lucidum has the most significant effects in improving thermal comfort and increasing humidity. Analysis based on Physiological Equivalent Temperature (PET) further indicates that vegetation configurations play a more substantial role in thermal comfort regulation than paving materials, and that different landscape elements exhibit synergistic and trade-off relationships in terms of cooling, humidification, and ventilation. This study provides quantitative reference for vegetation configuration and material selection in rural roads within the Loess Tableland region and similar semi-arid areas, enriches the research scope of rural microclimate studies, and offers scientific support for climate-adaptive rural planning and optimization of rural living environments.

This study proposes an orientation-responsive balcony sunspace integrating phase change material (PCM) storage with temperature-controlled mechanical ventilation for high-rise residential buildings. A validated model of a balcony–living-room system in Xi’an was used to evaluate southeast-, south-, and southwest-facing balconies. Phase-change temperature, latent heat capacity, PCM thickness, and ventilation rate were sequentially investigated using annual heating demand, cooling demand, and thermal comfort time ratio as performance indicators. The optimal phase-change temperatures were 26 °C, 27 °C, and 28 °C for the southeast, south, and southwest orientations, respectively, demonstrating the importance of matching PCM properties to orientation-dependent solar exposure. Within the investigated ranges, a latent heat capacity of 300 kJ/kg and a PCM thickness of 30 mm provided the best overall performance. Relative to the optimized PCM-only configurations, mechanical ventilation reduced heating demand by 3.3–5.6% and total thermal demand by 2.0–3.4%, while improving the comfort time ratio by 0.9–1.5 percentage points. Its benefit became limited above 6 ACH. The final integrated configurations reduced total thermal demand by 7.4–11.4% compared with the reference enclosed balconies. These results indicate that PCM contributed most of the overall improvement, whereas temperature-controlled ventilation provided a supplementary enhancement by improving winter solar-heat transfer. The findings provide an orientation-specific design approach for PCM–ventilation integrated balcony sunspaces.