Heat urban Island and Climate Change in Metropolitan Lima
Updated: Sep 12, 2022
National Agrarian University La Molina | Peru
Team members: Andres Fernando Figueroa Curo, Daniel Alfonso Lazo Fiestas, Valerie Mishell Rodriguez Llanos, and Nataly Lucila Zamudio Espinoza.
We are the group of National Agrarian University La Molina (Peru), Heat Urban Island and Climate Change in Metropolitan Lima. We are a group of proactive students motivated by research and innovation in climate and society. To enrich our perspective, the multidisciplinary team comprises Daniel Lazo, Valerie Rodriguez, Andrés Figueroa, and Nataly Zamudio from environmental engineering and meteorology careers of the UNALM -Peru. We will prepare maps in Lima of variables related to thermal comfort in people, and we will make maps projected until 2050 with CMIP6 models. These will be compared and evaluated. We are convinced that during the development of the project, we will strengthen teamwork, we will obtain more experience that will help us to consolidate knowledge and expand our vision, and we will obtain valuable information that will help decision-makers in our country to decide on new policies concerning the current climate crisis. In addition, we seek to motivate the academy with the production of new interdisciplinary research that makes its impacts visible at the local level.
Report 1: June 2022
What have we achieved during this time?
Due to one of our objectives being to give solutions to our topic, heat urban islands in Metropolitan Lima, during this time, we have already met with Metropolitan Lima Municipality’s representatives to explain our project idea and discuss how they can help us. They have decided to help us by sharing the contact of experts of the National Service of Meteorology and Hydrology (Senamhi) of Peru. Besides, we are projecting that our future workshops, meetings, and material like infographics or flyers about the forum will be shared on our Facebook fan page called “Círculo de Investigación en Cambio Climático - CICC.” That is the name of our research student group at our university. In addition, we contacted a German scientist who is an expert in urban heat islands in cities. We talked about research observations and methodologies of how we can research the urban heat island. Because there are no researchers or experts in Peru on this topic, we invited him to share a presentation on our fan page. The presentation is an introduction to urban heat islands, their relation to climate change, and why the generation of scientific information in countries is important. Also, he will talk a little bit about his research. The presentation will be on July 27, so all students and makers of this forum are invited; the language of the presentation will be in Spanish.
What do we expect for the next months?
We expect to review the state of the art of urban island heat and how to measure them through specific parameters, indexes, image satellites, etc. Then, if possible, we will start processing the meteorological data related to urban heat islands, finding an application, equation, or parameter in past studies for cities. Also, if possible, begin the processing of cmip6 data. Also, a constant task for the team is the self-training in GIS software and programming languages to process all the data we will achieve. Furthermore, to make our project visual, we plan to share all the advances on the Climate Change Research Circle’s Facebook and Instagram fan pages through infographic content; this will be shared in July. Finally, we expect to meet with Senamhi’s scientist to discuss accessibility to its data, past research, and the certainty of climate models in Peru.
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Report 2: July 2022
What have we done this month?
During this month, we have contacted scientists and professional people in urban heat islands of Peru to guide us in the available methodologies to evaluate urban heat islands. Also, one of those scientists agreed to hold an event on this topic, which has already been published on the official social media of the organization to which we belong (Climate Change Research Circle (CICC)). Also, this German scientist told us he could be our team's adviser, helped us with questions about the main topic, and recommended we practice program language R.
In turn, we have met again with the Municipality of Lima and the National Service of Meteorology and Hydrology representatives to fully define whether it is possible to work together on these proposals and evaluate their feasibility. In addition, we have been looking for methodologies to use in the research and downloading data on climate variables to be able to use it.
What do we expect to reach in the following months?
Next month we will begin to publish informative material on the CICC's social media on urban heat islands and their effect on the main cities of Peru. Likewise, we hope to define the methodology we will use to develop the project. Similarly, we hope to conduct a field inspection to identify Peru's hottest districts, analyzing the climate data and determining their causes. Finally, we will try to invite more scientists to talk about our main topic on social media because this is not a known theme in the country.
Report 3: August 2022
What do we have achieved during this time?
This month we have been reviewing heat island jobs and codes. In addition, we have reviewed a library called "LSTtool" in Rstudio (programming language). As a result, it was possible to verify that 4 important variables can be analyzed to study urban heat islands: NDVI, brightness temperature, emission, and land surface temperature. In addition, we worked together with specialists from the National Service of Meteorology and Hydrology (Senamhi) to define the methodology to work and to be able to develop the project together. Another achievement was that Dr. Richard Lemoine held a webinar on urban heat islands where different causes, consequences, and mitigation measures were explained in the previous month. You can find the presentation (in Spanish) here: https://fb.watch/f43W5kiaQB/.
What do we expect for the next months?
The following report should have obtained results by analyzing the satellite images of our area of interest. In addition, we hope to be able to write and give structure to the project's actual progress with the results obtained, thus providing it with a scientific approach. In addition, consult with Dr. Richard Lemoine regarding the results and preliminary analysis obtained for our study area. With this, we can receive effective feedback.
Another aspect to work on in the following months is the elaboration of the social aspect of our work through surveys of the population of Lima on the perception of heat islands and temperature from yesteryear to the present. For this, we will request the support of our mentor provided by the Forum itself (Eugenie Birch) with the certainty that your help will be critical to the development of this part of the project.
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