Spatial and Temporal Dynamics of Urban Heat Island and Their Relationship with Land Cover Changes in Urbanization Process: A Case Study in Suzhou, China

Abstract

One of the significant environmental consequences of urbanization is the urban heat island (UHI). In this paper, Landsat TM images of 1986 and 2004 were utilized to study the spatial and temporal variations of heat island and their relationships with land cover changes in Suzhou, a Chinese city which experienced rapid urbanization in past decades. Land cover classifications were derived to quantify urban expansions and brightness temperatures were computed from the TM thermal data to express the urban thermal environment. The spatial distributions of surface temperature indicated that heat islands had been largely broadened and showed good agreements with urban expansion. Temperature statistics of main land cover types showed that built-up and bare land had higher surface temperatures than natural land covers, implying the warming effect caused by the urbanization with natural landscape being replaced by urban areas. In addition, the spatial detail distributions of surface temperature were compared with the distribution of land cover by means of GIS buffer analysis. Results show remarkable show good correspondence between heat island variations with urban area expansions.

A Fused Variable by Night Light Images and MODIS Products for Improving Urban Built-Up Area Extraction

“…Other urban studies fused night light images and other images/products for urban area size extraction [31,32], urban spatialtemporal change analysis [33] and the simulation of socio-economic factors [34]. Most studies combined the MODIS products and daytime images with night light images to understand the urban built-up information, but few studies introduced the surface temperature, which is an important characteristic corresponding to the urbanization and heat island effect [35,36]. Urban heat islands occur in the regions with dense population, high building density and high concentration of the industry and commerce, while the heat island intensity of suburbs is low owing to the high vegetation cover rate [36].…”

Surface Urban Heat Island in Middle City: Spatial and Temporal Characteristics

“…With the advance of new geospatial technologies, researchers have increasingly used remote sensing data (e.g., satellite imagery) to study SUHI [6,[21][22][23]. Satellite remote sensing covers large areas and provides a direct and consistent way to examine the thermal environment of cities large [7,8,[24][25][26].…”

Intensidade E Modelagem Das Ilhas De Calor Urbanas De Superfície Em Cidades De Pequeno Porte: Análise Da Região Do Oeste Goiano

“…Comparado ao método tradicional, o sensoriamento remoto por satélite fornece uma maneira direta e consistente para examinar o ambiente térmico das cidades, podendo se obter uma cobertura espacial contínua de grandes áreas (ALVES, 2016;AMORIM;DUBREUIL;CARDOSO, 2015;XU;QIN;WAN, 2010), entretanto, conforme Alcoforado et al, (2007) e Lucena (2013) a ilha de calor urbana (ICU) difere da ilha de calor urbana de superfície (ICUS), pois a primeira se refere a diferença da temperatura do ar da área urbana em relação à rural, enquanto que a segunda se refere a temperatura da superfície.…”