Urban climate and environmental perception about climate change in Belém, Pará, Brazil

The primary goal of this work was to characterize Belém's climate change through the analysis of meteorological data from the local conventional surface station and to understand to what extent the climate change can be explained by the urbanization development. A secondary goal was to quantify whether and how part of Belém's population, from various neighborhoods and socioeconomic status, has perceived such changes. The results show that Belém is becoming hotter, drier and less windy, following a regional climate trend. The city has also experienced an increase in its annual accumulated precipitation, which may have been caused by alterations on atmospheric dynamics related to the urbanization process, which favors the development of stronger precipitation systems. The environmental perception analysis showed that these changes in climate were noticed by part of the population and that it was attributed to city development, even though the participants do not know basic concepts such as “weather”, “climate”, “meteorology” and “climate change”. The interviewees also have a clear picture that environmental conservation and conscientization are key to avoid/mitigate this climate change process. •The urban effect is not clearly appearing on some variables.•More strong precipitation events due to urbanization, opposing the regional trend.•Part of Belém's population perceive local climate change due to urbanization.•Impacts and adaptation strategies vary with neighborhood characteristics.