Heating in Skyrim's major cities

Skyrim is cold. Here's why the homes are not.

[Whiterun] (http://en.uesp.net/wiki/File:SR-place-Breezehome.jpg): The buildings of whiterun are simple (though ornate) wooden cabins. While the architecture may call dragons to mind with scale-like shingles on roofs and dragon heads carved into beams, cities cannot create fire through the Thu'um. The most common form of heating in Whiterun's buildings is a central open firepit. The notches seen in many of the roofs (where it doesn't meet the top beam) function as a simple chimney to draw smoke and embers out of the house. The high slopes of the roofs help this process. The windier it is, the better this system will work (if Bernoulli is relevant in Mundus) which explains why most of the residential buildings are at a higher elevation in the city. The aforementioned firepit may be seen as dangerous due to the fact that the buildings are primarily made of wood but that's probably why Whiterun has water running through the streets as opposed to underneath them.

Windhelm: Windhelm consists of many tightly packed stone buildings. Considering that Windhelm is the snowiest of Skyrim's major cities, there should be extensive heating. But there isn't, unless that fireplace in Candlehearth Hall is heating the entire city. Stone is not a very good insulator, so really, everybody in that city should be dead. However, it was allegedly built by Shalidor,(I have been informed that it was Winterhold that was built by magic, which is why baggage claims are not the best spot to wirte about lore) so magic seems to be the most likely explanation as to why the city wasn't buried in snow long ago.

Riften:Riften is a prime example of modern Nord wood-and-stone architecture. Heating is not a major concern in Riften due to warm air from the volcanic fields to the north. Still, nowhere in Skyrim is particularly warm, so teh few scattered chimneys of Riften reveal that a simple fireplace is the preferred method of keeping warm. Interestingly, Mistveil Keep has a large open fire pit and no obvious place for the smoke to go, so I think the Jarl is trying to burn down the city again, or is very very stupid.

Solitude: Beyond that one chimney, Solitude has few visible means of heating. It is obviously one of the warmer cities, so heating is not a primary concern, leaving the city free to explore more opulent architecture than elsewhere in Skyrim. By observing the direction the windmill turns as well as the structure of the blades I concluded that the wind comes primarily form the harbor rather than the sea. Thus warm harbor air blows back against the frigid sea breeze of the Sea of Ghost, keeping Solitude warm. The primary inlet of Solitude's harbor is the Karth river, so I must conclude that it is warm and thus the hot air rises off of that.

Markarth: Markarth is basically the aboveground portion of a massive Dwemer city, that has people living in it, so the architecture is that unique style of the deep elves. The reach is probably one of the warmer, maybe the warmest, hold of Skyrim. For evidence of that claim, I put forward the Forsworn. Just look at their clothes! It must be at least fairly warm for a non Nord to think fur underwear is enough to keep warm. Still, stone is a lousy insulator, so I surmise that the Dwemer pumped hot steam through the walls of many buildings and up to the mountains to cool, where it condenses into the (I theorize rather warm) water that flows through the city. Considering the number of Dwemer ruins in the reach and near Karth tributaries, I propose that this system warms not just the the homes of Markarth, but the Karth river. This leads to a warmer reach, and also a warm Solitude.