Analysis of the Relationship between Forest Fire and Land Surface Temperature using Landsat 8 OLI/TIRS Imagery

Abstract

Forest fires are the main threat to the sustainability of forests around the world destroying the valuable forest biodiversity and nearby infrastructure. Forest covers provide shading, cooling the environment, and lower thermal absorption. However, the changes in forest cover due to forest fires increase the land surface temperature (LST) locally. This study is aimed to analyze the relationship between forest fires and LST using Landsat-8 OLI/TIRS imagery in Kuala Baram, Sarawak. More than 1500ha of forests and plantations have been destroyed after 26 days of fires, deteriorating the air quality to hazardous levels, damaging the nearby house and infrastructure. The differenced normalized burn ratio (dNBR) between pre-fire and post-fire NBR was used to estimate the burn severity categories in Kuala Baram, Sarawak. It was found that the burn severity ranges from moderate-low to moderate-high levels. The correlation between forest fire and LST in Kuala Baram, Sarawak in June 2019 and September 2019 was calculated using Pearson’s correlation coefficients. It indicates the strongest negative relationship between NBR and LST in pre-fires (R2 =-0.985) and post-fires (R2 =-0.996). The findings from this study showed that forest fires also affecting the land surface temperature of Kuala Baram, Sarawak along with the physical damages that have been diminished from the forest fires occurrences.