Impacts of Land Use and Cover Change on Land Surface Temperature in the Zhujiang Delta1

ABSTRACTRemote sensing and geographic information systems (GIS) technologies were used to detect land use/cover changes (LUCC) and to assess their impacts on land surface temperature (LST) in the Zhujiang Delta. Multi-temporal Landsat TM and Landsat ETM+ data were employed to identify patterns of LUCC as well as to quantify urban expansion and the associated decrease of vegetation cover. The thermal infrared bands of the data were used to retrieve LST. The results revealed a strong and uneven urban growth, which caused LST to raise 4.56°C in the newly urbanized part of the study area. Overall, remote sensing and GIS technologies were effective approaches for monitoring and analyzing urban growth patterns and evaluating their impacts on LST.