Impact of Land Surface Temperature (LST) and Ground Air Temperature (Tair) on Land Use and Land Cover (LULC): An Investigative Study

Abstract

The Land Surface Temperature (LST) is the fundamental concept of measuring the temperature of the ground or soil using remote sensing technologies. LST is an essential environmental parameter that has several uses in meteorology, climatology, agriculture, urban planning, and environmental monitoring. Remote sensing instruments, such as thermal infrared sensors aboard satellites, provide the means to capture LST data on a global scale. LST and ground air temperature ( ) are two related but distinct measures that provide valuable insights into different aspects: LST refers to the temperature of the Earth's surface, and it provides information about the temperature of the soil or crop canopy, which can impact plant growth and development, on the other hand  measures the temperature of the surrounding air, which influences the rate of evaporation, transpiration, and photosynthesis in plants. In this study, a linear regression equation was developed to correlate the LST and  using air temperature data of 19th March 2017, and 14th March 2021 from the two meteorological stations namely Veganpur and Main Maize Research Station (MMRS) of the Godhra region. The Landsat 8 thermal and optical bands were used to estimate LST, whereas Sentinel 2 optical data was used for the Land Use and Land Cover (LULC) purpose. To correlate LST with , eight ground truth (GT) points were collected from both stations, namely the minimum and maximum air temperatures in 2017 and 2021. The satellite derived LST data and the maximum ground air temperature ( ) were found to strongly concur, with an R2 value of 0.97. It was noted that a temperature difference of 2.9°C was found between the maximum ground air temperature  and the Land Surface Temperature (LST).  Study showed that from 2017 to 2021, the area used for agriculture, forestry, water bodies, and barren land decreased from 75.62 to 71.51%, 15.17 to 14.30%, 1.60 to 1.38%, and 0.03 to 0.02%, respectively, however the area used for build-up increased from 7.59 to 12.79%.  During a five-year period, the study identified an enhancement in Land Surface Temperature (LST) due to an increase in built-up area. A temperature change was also seen throughout the course of the five-year period as a result of variations in LULC. Overall, it came to light that, under specific conditions and speculation, LST estimated using thermal data from Landsat 8 can be closely associated with ground air maximum temperature.