Abstract
The current accelerated urbanization is modifying the geographic energy balance by making city centers warmer than their outlying zones. This phenomenon is exemplified by urban heat islands. Globally, the warming of urban zones leads to an increase in the land surface temperature (LST). Nonetheless, the sophisticated relationship between the LST and its determining factors has not yet been fully investigated, especially in terms of indirect and direct effects. This paper proposes a new structural methodology that contributes to the emerging literature by quantifying the direct and indirect effects, among latent variables, of factors that could significantly influence the distribution of the LST. The determining factors are divided into two classes: natural geo-topographic aspects and human interventions, and the methodology is developed in the contextual form of structural equation models based on remote sensing and statistical data for Lebanon. The results show that: (1) the LST increases simultaneously as urban and human activities are extended; (2) human activities and the LST decrease where the topographic and geographic aspects, mainly the elevation and slope, increase. However, indirect linear regressions reveal that the geo-topographic aspects present some contradictory natural properties that counteract and resist the contribution of human activities in elevating the LST. It is essential to put this methodology into practice as a guiding tool for future urban planners and decision makers in the phase of developing and implementing solutions and enacting relevant policies. The results could also be employed (a) for identifying potential sources of renewable energies and (b) when developing relevant effective solutions.
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The rasterized datasets generated and analyzed during the current study are available intthe Mendeley Data repository, https://data.mendeley.com/datasets/rmygt6vk8f/1.
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Conceptualization, methodology, analysis and validation: WA-S, OB, GF; resources, data curation, software: WA-S, MA-S; writing—original draft preparation: WA-S, OB, NZ; supervision, writing—reviewing and editing: WA-S, OB, GF, MA-S.
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Al-Shaar, W., Bonin, O., Faour, G. et al. Spatial analysis of land surface temperature distribution: case of the Greater Beirut Area. Euro-Mediterr J Environ Integr 7, 483–495 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s41207-022-00330-6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s41207-022-00330-6