Utilising weather station (ISD), and satellite and population (GHSL-SMOD) datasets to estimate Urban Heat Island over locations in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region

Local weather and climate conditions are affected by the presence of cities, through their perturbation of the surface energy balance. A well-know manifestation is the Urban Heat Island (UHI) in which land surface and near surface air temperatures are higher over a city compared to its rural surroundings. In this work, we explore the suitability of air temperature station records, in conjunction with urbanization data derived from land and population data, to provide credible urban-rural temperature differences for the MENA region.

Specifically, for air temperature we utilize daily and sub-daily time-series from the Integrated Surface Database (ISD), resulting in more than 300 station records for the MENA. We subsequently characterize the degree of urbanization of these stations using the gridded, 1km x km GHSL Settlement model (GHSL-SMOD) data that calculate 8 classes of urban and rural spatial entities from built-up area (Landsat) and population (CIESIN Gridded Population of the World) data. Examples of the derived UHI magnitude from the identified station pairs will be shown, and the associated assumptions and limitations of the followed approach will be discussed.