Abstract
The Urban Heat Island (UHI) phenomenon, namely urban areas where the atmospheric temperature is significantly higher than in the surrounding rural areas, is currently a very well-known topic both in the scientific community and in public debates. Growing urbanization is one of the anthropic causes of UHI. The UHI phenomenon has a negative impact on the life quality of the local population (thermal discomfort, summer thermal shock, etc.), thus investigations and analyses on this topic are really useful and important for correct and sustainable urban planning; this study is included in this context. A multi-temporal analysis was performed in the municipality of Modena (Italy) to identify and estimate the Surface Urban Heat Island (SUHI, strictly correlated to the UHI phenomenon) from 2014 to 2017. For this purpose, Landsat-8 satellite images were processed with Quantum Geographic Information System (QGIS) to obtain the Land Surface Temperature (LST) and the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI). For every pixel, LST and NDVI values of three regions of interest (ROI, i.e., Countryside, Suburbs, and City Center) were extracted and their correlations were investigated. A maximum variation of 6.4 °C in the LST values between City Center and Countryside was highlighted, confirming the presence of the SUHI phenomenon even in a medium-sized municipality like Modena. The implemented procedure demonstrates that satellite data are suitable for SUHI identification and estimation, therefore it could be a useful tool for public administration for urban planning policies.
Highlights
About half of the world population lives in urban areas [1]
The Urban Heat Island (UHI) phenomenon has a negative impact on the life quality of the local population, investigations and analyses on this topic are really useful and important for correct and sustainable urban planning; this study is included in this context
Landsat-8 satellite images were processed with Quantum Geographic Information System (QGIS) to obtain the Land Surface Temperature (LST) and the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI)
Summary
The global urbanization rate is expected to increase by 70% compared to the current world population [2], both because of the continued emergence of new urban areas [3] and because of the constant population migration from rural to urban and suburban areas [4,5]. Urbanization has a negative impact on the environment, mainly due to pollution, changes in the physical and chemical properties of the atmosphere, and in the type of cover of the soil surface [11]. These phenomena lead to so-called Urban Heat Islands (UHI), namely urban areas where the atmospheric temperature is significantly higher than that in the surrounding rural areas [12]. The temperature increase has effects on the environment (higher temperatures cause higher energy consumption, photochemical smog, and worsening of the air quality), on the climate and on human health [13,14,15,16]
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