Abstract
This paper investigates land use change and assesses its impact on surface temperature in the city of João Pessoa, Paraíba State, between 1991 and 2010. Landsat images were utilized to quantify the changes and surface temperature variability in 1991, 2006 and 2010. The images were pre-processed using calibration techniques and geometric and atmospheric corrections were performed. Supervised classification using the Maximum Likelihood technique and spatial reclassification were employed for land use classification. Five land-use/land-cover categories (urban area, shrubland vegetation, herbaceous vegetation and water) were identified. The integration of Remote Sensing and Geographical Information Systems was applied to examine the impact of land-use change on surface temperatures. The results revealed a notable land-use change in the study area. The most significant changes in land use and land cover classes occurred in urban areas and herbaceous vegetation. The highest values of surface temperature were estimated on the urban classes and bare soil. The results also showed that the greatest temperature variation occurred in the period between 2006 and 2010 due to the increase in the urban area class in all areas of João Pessoa.
Keywords:
Urban climate; Urban planning; Geotechnologies.
