Are Urban Surface Temperatures Warming Faster Than Rural?

As global warming intensifies, urban areas are experiencing rising temperatures, with notable effects on the residents' health and well-being. Satellite-derived Land Surface Temperatures (LST) provide an independent measure of surface temperature change, with long time series of LST becoming indispensable for studying the impacts of climate warming at local, regional, and global level. Recent studies have shown a consistent rise in LST across cities; however, it remains unclear how this change compares to that of the surrounding rural areas. In this work, we aim to determine whether the LST of cities is warming faster, slower, or at the same rate as the surrounding rural areas. To answer this question, we analyze 19 years (2002–2021) of daily Aqua MODIS data from the European Space Agency’s Climate Change Initiative project on LST (LST_cci). Our focus is on nighttime conditions, as the relationship between LST and near-surface air temperature over cities is strongest during this time-of-day. We analyze our results as a function of climate, considering the Local Climate Zone (LCZ) makeup of each city, as well as changes in city size, cloud cover, Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI), and air temperature (obtained from reanalysis data) during the same period. Our findings suggest that the LST of rural areas is warming slightly faster than that of urban areas, especially in tropical and dry climates.