UCLIMESA is an exploratory project sustaining fundamental scientific research, multidisciplinarity, and interdisciplinarity in a consistent effort for better understanding the urban climate and the associated use of remote sensing technologies.
Rationale: Urban climate is a major element for the human well-being and environmental stability, and climate challenges expected for the next decades may exert additional pressures on the metropolitan areas. Air and surface temperature is particularly modified within urban spots, generating what is known as Urban Heat Island (UHI). The current and long-term monitoring of the urban climate would deliver fundamental information for development strategies, and one important restriction in urban climate research is the limited number of ground based meteorological sensors compared to the characteristic environmental heterogeneity. Especially after 2000, satellite remote sensing provides the possibility to retrieve spatially quasi-continuous meteorological information, and it is therefore a valuable tool for analysing heterogeneous surfaces.
In this context, the main scientific goal is to analyse the characteristics of the UHI over the city of Bucharest, both under the present climate and in the long-term climate change perspective (2021-2050), by integrating data retrieved from satellite imagery, ground-based meteorological stations and urban sensors.
The key terms that define the project from conceptual point of view are: satellite remote sensing, urban climate, and climate change.
UCLIMESA will supply several worth mentioning results: enhanced remote sensing products, and identification of the needs for further development; more accurate delimitation and enhanced understanding of the current UHI; theoretical and applied knowledge on the relationships between LST and the triggering factors in urban environment; valuable and transferable experience in combining various satellite products, and ground measurements into an integrated monitoring system; better understanding of the possible climate change impact on the UHI; updated knowledge on the climate of Bucharest.
Apart from its scientific and methodological objectives, the project UCLIMESA has the ambition to provide outputs and results that could sustain the TRL (Technology Readiness Level) progress in terms of performance, schedule, and budget from level 2 to level 3.