The NERC URGENT thematic programme was set up to integrate urban environmental research across the geological, ecological, freshwater and atmospheric sciences. It worked in partnership with city authorities, industry and regulatory bodies.

The thematic programme began in 1998 and lasted for 7 years.

Universities Weather Research Network (UWERN) Urban Meteorology Programme (URBMET) was a NERC Urban Regeneration and the Environment (URGENT) Air project (GST/02/2231 - Duration: 1/01/1999 - 30/6/2002) led by Dr Stephen Belcher, University of Reading.

The key issues of this project were:

-how boundary-layer motions drive small-scale street-level circulations within the urban canopy
-how street-level circulations feed back into the larger-scale boundary-layer above by mixing heat, moisture and momentum
-how small-scale circulations within the streets mix pollutants from street-level into the boundary-layer above
-how larger-scale motions above affect the mixing.

This work brought together expertise from dynamical and observational meteorology, and theoretical and experimental fluid dynamics to make full-scale and laboratory measurements of the atmospheric boundary-layer over urban areas. The project developed a sound understanding of the processes of mixing and transport from the street-level into the boundary-layer. It also developed methods for parameterising these processes in urban-scale dispersion models and in numerical weather prediction models through an urban canopy model of urban areas.