Study on the influencing factors and the spatiotemporal heterogeneity of Urban Heat Island effect in Nanchang City of China

Abstract

ABSTRACT Although some researchers have explored spatiotemporal characteristics of the land surface temperature (LST) and analyzed how the influencing factors impact the LST, the comprehensive influencing factors and specific spatial relationships that explore the Urban Heat Island (UHI) effect from long time scale have rarely received widespread attention. Taking Nanchang as an example, this paper first uses Landsat data to retrieve the LST in years 2000, 2010, and 2019. Then, the Geographically Weighted Regression (GWR) model is utilized to investigate the various influencing factors. The results showed as follows: (1) The UHI effect was intensified in the past 20 years in Nanchang City. From 2000 to 2019, the “heat island” increased from 63.06% to 64.07%, while the “green island” decreased from 36.94% to 35.93%. (2) The spatiotemporal anisotropy of the UHI effect was significant. (3) The GWR model could better reveal the spatial heterogeneity of the factors affecting the UHI effects. The relationship between Soil Brightness Index (NDSI), Normalized Difference Built-up Index (NDBI), and Night-lighting (NL) and the relative UHI effect intensity had significant spatial non-stationarity. This study can provide some references from reasonable urban planning to alleviate the urban heat island.