Proceedings Article | 6 August 2018
KEYWORDS: Earth observing sensors, Landsat, Climate change, Clouds, Temperature metrology, Climatology, Calibration, Java, Ecosystems, Biological research
Spatial data on temperature are of importance to the studies concerning the roles of climate, including the impacts of climate change on ecosystem functions and ecosystem services. However, most temperature data are available at station level, sparsely and irregularly distributed across space as points, and the accuracies of spatial-interpolation-based surface models decrease with decreasing density of the observation points. Meanwhile, relationship between elevation and temperature has been acknowledged, which basis is grounded in thermodynamics theory by Robert Clausius, and later known as altitudinal temperature lapse rate. Most studies related to altitudinal temperature lapse rate in Indonesia have been using and scaling-up the findings from Cornelis Braak, based on his research in Java during the 1920s. According to Braak, temperature decreases by 0.60°C and 0.55°C as the elevation increases by 100 m asl, for areas below and above 1500 asl, respectively. With regards to climate change, Braak’s findings should be updated, since it determines climatic geo-data, used for strategic geo-planning (e.g. for suitability mapping). Thus, in this respect, the study is aimed at revisiting altitudinal temperature lapse rates in Indonesia using thermal-infrared bands of Landsat 8. With regards to Braak’s observation stations, one window area in Bogor, West Java, Indonesia was selected as the study site. The results suggest that altitudinal temperature lapse rate decreased from 0.0016 to 0.0021° C.m-1, as compared to Braak’s equation, which indicate significant temperature increase. The results also suggest that temperature increase in the window area was about 1.58°C, doubled from temperature increase at global scale of about 0.8°C, which implies to losses of montane and sub montane zones according to Holdridge life zone of about 7 km2 (100%) and 727 km2 (32.53%), respectively; and gain of basal zone of about 734 km2 (211.77%).
