Land Surface Temperature Responses to Land Use Land Cover Dynamics (District of Taroudant, Morocco)

Land surface temperature plays an essential role in estimating radiation budgets, in heat balance studies, as a control for climate dynamics and for soil–vegetation–atmosphere transfer modeling, and in studying the impact of land use/land cover (LULC) changes at the regional level. This study provides a comprehensive evaluation of the relationship between land use and land surface temperature (LST), through a landscape dynamics assessment based on multi-source and multi-sensor remote sensing technologies. In particular, the study was performed using Landsat satellite 5 TM, ETM, and OLI 8 data for three different dates (1985, 2001 and 2017) and aimed to assess the effects of land use/land cover changes on the LST distribution in the region of Taroudant, Morocco. Spatial and statistical analysis and comparison of maps generated from remotely sensed data using GIS indicate the existence of different changes in the Taroudant region between 1985 and 2017. These changes are predominantly characterized by an increase in built-up areas and bare ground and a decrease in natural areas (vegetation, forest, etc.). The average temperatures in 1985, 2001 and 2017 in open forests were 32.74 °C, 34.37 °C and 39.17 °C, respectively. The farming greenhouse temperatures were 24.09 °C, 28.5 °C, 35.58 °C, and barren soils 37.14 °C, 38.38 °C, 40.01 °C. The average land surface temperatures of farming lands were 24.31 °C, 27.87 °C and 28.61 °C, respectively. As a result, soil artificialization and everything associated with it, such as greenhouse gas emissions, and abusive consumption of farming and natural land, are likely to be the origin of environmental problems and climate change marked mainly by these changes in surface temperature, irregular rainfall, and unprecedented periods of drought.