Commentary: Earth observations of urban heat – Insights from NASA DEVELOP

Source abstract

During the last decade, NASA DEVELOP has conducted more than 45 urban heat projects with cities and community action groups. Through this work, the DEVELOP Program gained insight into sensors that can be useful to communities seeking to mitigate and manage urban heat. DEVELOP partners with cities and other entities to use Earth observation data—often available at no cost—to characterize urban heat hazards and to inform policy, planning, and action. Highlighting case studies from select projects, the DEVELOP team details the use of Earth observations from sources such as Landsat 8 and International Space Station–based ECOSTRESS and describes how the Earth observations can be related to contextual socioeconomic datasets.