Evaluation of Landscape Dynamics in City Thermal Islands (Case Study: City of Birjand, Iran)

چکیده مقاله

One of the most common climatic phenomena associated with urban issues is urban heat islands. Therefore, it is essential for urban planning to study this phenomenon. This article aims to investigate the performance of extraction methods for heat islands and introduce the prior method. Also, identify and analyze the landscape dynamics of heat islands over time in the study area. For this purpose, at first, the land surface temperature (LST) in the city of Birjand, was extracted using the satellite images in the years 2000–2019 in two cold and warm seasons using the mono-window, Planck's equation, radiative transfer equation, and single-channel method in the two seasons of summer and winter. The statistical method of mean absolute error was used for the comparison and selection of the accurate method. The results showed that the accuracy of the single-channel method (Landsat) was higher than other algorithms (MAE = 3.38 °C). The landscape dynamics were also identified using a package of landscape metrics, including PSSD, MPS, CA, NP, and MPFD. On the other hand, during the study period, the summer trend of the city's air quality showed an improvement in the condition of the land in the southern and eastern parts, and the winter trend showed an improvement in the condition of the land in the eastern to northern parts of the city. As a result, the phenomenon of urban heat islands in hot, dry weather causes a decrease in the temperature of the earth's surface with the increase of urban areas.