The Application of Thermal Urban Remote Sensing to Understand and Monitor Urban Climates

Dear Colleagues,

For about four decades, thermal infrared (TIR) remote sensing has been a promising source of information concerning surface urban heat island (SUHI) intensity and its spatial distribution. However, operational thermal monitoring of urban areas remains elusive. Three major obstacles restrict the routine exploitation of TIR data. First, the high spatiotemporal variability of the UHI implies specific requirements regarding both the spatial and temporal resolutions of observations that are not yet fulfilled by any of the space-borne sensors currently available. Second, the interpretation and application of thermal remote sensing observations are complicated by biased sampling of complex three-dimensional urban surfaces and by variations in surface emissivity. Third, only the land surface (skin) temperature (LST), from which the SUHI is defined, can be measured by these instruments, whereas it is air temperature that mostly impacts human activities. The retrieval of the latter from space measurements remains a scientific challenge despite great advances in the development of urban energy balance (UEB) models and urban canopy schemes of differing complexities. These models can comprehensively simulate the radiative and turbulent transfers between the surface and the urban atmosphere, but they are dependent on a large number of meteorological and surface parameters as boundary conditions that are rarely available. Additionally, many of those models lack independent evaluation.

Simultaneously, a notable paradigm shift has recently been made in how the urban heat island is defined within the area of urban climatology. Specifically, there is a move away from the traditional dichotomy between urban and rural towards defining urban structures with homogeneous thermal responses, called local climate zones (LCZ). Remote sensing inherently has the advantage of providing a more holistic view of the entire city and LCZs can well be classified by moderate resolution multi-temporal multi-spectral data. Hence, this concept can be readily adopted for investigating the SUHI phenomenon and therefore define a better standard than do the numerous definitions of urban and rural applied in SUHI studies.

Both the urban remote sensing and the urban climatology community are invited to contribute to this Special Issue, which focuses on multi-temporal analyses of remote sensing data as well as remote sensing-modeling interfaces. We invite you to submit articles concerning your recent research with respect to the following topics:

-          Validation of UEB models via remote sensing LST;

-          Assimilation and other possible uses of satellite-derived LST in urban canopy schemes;

-          Downscaling / disaggregation of LST data over urban areas;

-          Parametrization of urban air temperatures from remote sensing data;

-          Application of the LCZ concept in remote sensing SUHI studies;

-          Derivation of surface parameters for urban canopy models;

-          Urban surface structure and its linkage to thermal anisotropy and emissivity;

-          Multi-temporal SUHI analysis that use large datasets;

-          Diurnal and / or seasonal evolution of the SUHI;

-          Operational retrieval of urban temperatures and high-level services;

-          Derivation of surface energy fluxes in cities based on LST observations.

Authors are required to check and follow the specific Instructions to Authors; see https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/165068305/Remote_Sensing-Additional_Instructions.pdf.

Dr. Benjamin Bechtel
Dr. Iphigenia Keramitsoglou
Dr. Simone Kotthaus
Dr. James A. Voogt
Dr. Klemen Zakšek
Guest Editors

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