Urban heat island effect over Delhi NCR using LANDSAT™ data

In this paper, the authors have analysed the phenomenon of urban heat island using LANDSAT (TM) data for the Delhi NCR region applying the mono-window algorithm. The spatial pattern of land surface temperature (LST) from 2001 to 2019 was retrieved to study its effect on urban heat island, henceforth referred to as UHI. The LST maps of 26 profiles spread over the entire study area for every year were studied to find any corroboration. The authors conclude that the UHI effect increased during 2001-2010 as the region underwent a massive infrastructure development phase. During 2010-2016, it showed a decreasing trend due to an increase in forest cover and the various government initiatives to minimise the effect of construction activities and climate change. However, beyond 2016, the LST and UHI data shows an increasing trend. The calculated LST value is observed to be highest in 2018 whereas the UHI effect is increasing and has been obtained as the maximum in 2019, giving rise to localised climate change. This indicates that the earlier initiatives taken are no longer effective and new steps need to be taken to minimise the effect of UHI.