Heidelinde Trimmel

Research Scholar

Sustainable Service Systems Research Group

Energy, Climate, and Environment Program

Biography

Heidelinde Trimmel is a postdoc researcher in the Sustainable Service Systems Research Group of the IIASA Energy, Climate, and Environment Program where she focuses on the feedback and interlinkages between energy transition and urban climate. She is a boundary layer and urban meteorologist working with numeric modeling, model adaptation and development, offline coupling, interpretation of atmospheric and land surface model output, and data analysis using remote sensing and other observational data.

She studied Technical Physics at the Technical University of Vienna (TU Vienna) and later obtained her diploma in Landscape Planning from the Vienna University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, with an early focus on land/atmosphere interactions and a diploma thesis at the Institute of Meteorology and Climatology (BOKU-Met) evaluating the microclimatic effects of open space planning using numeric modeling and observations. She holds a PhD in Meteorology from BOKU-Met.

Trimmel has been actively engaged as a scientist at BOKU-Met since October 2007, where she has dedicated her efforts to investigating various aspects of urban climate. Her research has included studying not only optical and thermal surface properties, vegetation dynamics, energy balance, and photovoltaics, but also riparian shade and its influence on water temperature. This work has allowed her to gain valuable insights into the complex dynamics of microscale environments and the impact of landscape planning on climate.

From 2010 to 2011, she presented research findings at the European Commission in Brussels on developing climate indicators specifically tailored for European regions, aiming to enhance our understanding of regional climate impact patterns. From 2010 to 2013, she engaged in scientific projects at the Department of Urban Design and Landscape at TU Vienna. Here, her research centered around exploring the influence of open space design and urban morphology on microclimates. This work contributed to a broader comprehension of the factors shaping local climates within urban areas.

In 2016, Trimmel had the opportunity to work as a scientist at Meteo Science, further expanding her knowledge and expertise in the field of meteorology. In 2016 and 2017 she embarked on research stays in Toulouse, France, at the Meteo France Centre National de Recherches Meteorologiques (CNRM) - Ville et Climat urbain. From March 2019 to February 2020, she was awarded the Marietta Blau scholarship from Austria’s Agency for Education and Internationalisation (OeAD), which facilitated a research stay at Norsk Institutt for Luftforskning (NILU) in Norway, where she worked on satellite data assimilation and biogenic volatile organic compound modeling. This experience enabled her to deepen her understanding of the interlinkage between atmospheric surface conditions, soil moisture, vegetation, and air pollution.

She has presented her work at various conferences and workshops, including at the European Geosciences Union (EGU) General Assembly and the International Conference on Urban Climate (ICUC). Trimmel has also contributed to several scientific projects. In addition to her research work, she has teaching experience in applied statistics, boundary layer climatology, climate science, and meteorological experiments. She has served as a reviewer in Geoscientific Model Development and Theoretical and Applied Climatology, and is contributing author of the first Austrian Assessment Report and the Austrian Panel on Climate Change (APCC) Special Report on land use and climate change (SR21).

Last update: 16 JUN 2023

Publications

Trimmel, H., Hamer, P., Mayer, M., Schreier, S.F., Weihs, P., Eitzinger, J., Sandén, H., Fitzky, A.C., Richter, A., Calvet, J.-C., Bonan, B., Meurey, C., Vallejo, I., Eckhardt, S., Santos, G.S., Oumami, S., Arteta, J., Marécal, V., Tarrasón, L., Karl, T., & Rieder, H. (2023). The influence of vegetation drought stress on formaldehyde and ozone distributions over a central European city. Atmospheric Environment 304 e119768. 10.1016/j.atmosenv.2023.119768.

Sandén, H. & Trimmel, H. (2023). Unsere Stadtbäume unter Stress - Über Stressreaktionen der Bäume auf Salz und Trockenheit und deren Auswirkungen auf die Luftqualität. In: Wiener Naturschutzbund, May 2023, Vienna.

Weihs, P., Trimmel, H., Gützer, C., Sadriu, M., Eitzinger, S., Thaler, S., Mursch-Radlgruber, E., Formayer, H., Perny, K., Pröll, T., Wöss, D., Hofer, A., Rauch, H.P., Hörbinger, S., Szocska, D., Preiss, J., Wittkowski, M., Masson, V., Schoetter, R., & Sdchmidt, T. (2023). Impact of longer Drought Periods on Climate in Greater Vienna: appropriate Mitigation measures (Imp_DroP). In: 23. Österreichischer Klimatag - Ressourcen im Wandel, 11-13 April 2023, Montanuniversität Leoben.

Hamer, P., Trimmel, H., Calvet, J.-C., Bonan, B., Meurey, C., Vallejo, I., Eckhardt, S., Sousa-Santos, G., Marecal, V., & Tarrason, L. (2023). The Impact of Recent European Droughts and Heatwaves on Trace
Gas Surface Fluxes: Insights from Land Surface Data Assimilation. In: EGU General Assembly 2023, 23-28 April 2023, Vienna.

Thaler, S., Eitzinger, J., Formayer, H., Gützer, C., Hofer, A., Hörbinger, S., Masson, V., Mursch-Radlgruber, E., Perny, K., Preiss, J., Pröll, T., Rauch, H., Sadriu, M., Schmidt, S., Schoetter, R., Szocska, D., Trimmel, H., Wittkowski, M., Wöß, D., & Weihs, P. (2023). Cooling potential of green spaces in the Vienna metropolitan area during extended periods of drought. In: EMS Annual Meeting 2023, 3-8 September 2023, Bratislava.