An urban energy balance-guided machine learning approach for synthetic nocturnal surface Urban Heat Island prediction: A heatwave event in Naples

Southern European functional urban areas (FUAs) are increasingly subject to heatwave (HW) events, calling for an-ticipated climate adaptation measures. In the urban context, such adaptation strategies require a thorough under-standing of the built-up response to the incoming solar radiation, i.e., the urban energy balance cycle and its implications for the Urban Heat Island (UHI) effect. Despite readily available, diurnal Land Surface Temperature (LST) data does not provide a meaningful picture of the UHI, in these midlatitudes FUAs. On the contrary, the mid-morning satellite overpass is characterized by the absence of a significant surface UHI (SUHI) signal, corre-sponding to the period of the day when the urban-rural air temperature difference is typically negative. Conversely, nocturnal high-resolution LST data is rarely available. In this study, an energy balance-based machine learning ap-proach is explored, considering the Local Climate Zones (LCZ), to describe the daily cycle of the heat flux components and predict the nocturnal SUHI, during an HW event. While the urban and rural spatial outlines are not visible in the diurnal thermal image, they become apparent in the latent and storage heat flux maps - built-up infrastructures up -take heat during the day which is released back into the atmosphere, during the night, whereas vegetation land sur-faces loose diurnal heat through evapotranspiration. For the LST prediction model, a random forest (RF) approach is implemented. RF results show that the model accurately predicts the LST, ensuring mean square errors inferior to 0.1 K. Both the latent and storage heat flux components, together with LCZ classification, are the most important ex-planatory variables for the nocturnal LST prediction, supporting the adoption of the energy balance approach. In fu -ture research, other locations and time-series data shall be trained and tested, providing an efficient local urban climate monitoring tool, where in-situ air temperature observations are not available. (c) 2021 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Automated summary

Southern European functional urban areas are facing more heatwave events, requiring climate adaptation measures. Understanding the urban energy balance cycle and its implications for the Urban Heat Island effect is crucial. A study using energy balance and machine learning methods to predict nocturnal Urban Heat Island effects shows promising results.