Mapping Land Surface Temperature Changes from Land Use and Land Cover Changes by Remote Sensing techniques in case of Bule Hora Town, Oromia Region, Ethiopia

This study investigates the rising land surface temperature in Bule Hora Town, Ethiopia, using thermal infrared data from Landsat-8 satellite imagery. Land surface temperature has increased each year, primarily due to changes in land use and land cover. Images with less than 10% cloud cover were obtained for both dry and rainy seasons between December and August. Image preprocessing and rectification were conducted using ArcGIS 10.8 software. Shapefiles of Bule Hora Town were used to extract the study area from the full scenes. Land surface temperature was calculated using the Split Window algorithm. Thermal band digital numbers were converted to top-of-atmosphere spectral radiance using radiance rescaling factors. Land surface emissivity (LSE) was also calculated to assess the efficiency of thermal energy transmission from the surface to the atmosphere. The results indicate temperature variations across different locations within Bule Hora Town, with a substantial increase in overall land surface temperature from 12.86°C in 2002 to 30.93°C in 2022. This temperature rise is directly linked to the observed decline in vegetation cover in the study area.