How Do Natural Factor and Human Activity Affect Urban Land Surface Heat Environment in China?

In climate change adaptation and mitigation, including the reduction of negative impacts associated with urban heat environment, it is essential to quantify the contributions of natural and anthropogenic factors. Using remotely sensed land surface temperature, emissivity, land use types, and nightlight data for 364 Chinese cities, we proposed an urban land surface heat environment change attribution algorithm based on land use types, attributing the change of urban land surface heat environment to natural factors, land use change, and other anthropogenic factors at urban scale. From 2005 to 2020, summer daytime land surface temperature decreased and increased in 40.93% and 59.07% of these cities, respectively. Natural factors made a larger contribution than land use change and other anthropogenic factors to urban land surface temperature changes in 79.67% of cities; in 60.44% of cities, other anthropogenic factors other than land use change and natural factors experienced the highest contribution intensities. Three factors were spatially heterogeneous. Urban land surface temperatures were influenced by background natural climate endowment and human social development values, increasing with population density (up to 2,000 people center dot km-2) and annual precipitation (up to 800 mm center dot year-1). These results have important implications for the detection and attribution of urban-scale climate change and will be useful in designing management plans to optimize land use configuration, lead in climate actions, and carry out collaborative mitigation and adaptation strategies to achieve sustainable development.