The Governance Process and the Influence on Heat Islands in the City of Quevedo, Coastal Ecuador

This article addresses the study of the governance process and the influence of urban heat islands in the city of Quevedo on the coast of Ecuador, and thus contributes to the production of technical and scientific information with a view to their mitigation. To identify the UHI pattern and visualize the temperature distribution on the soil surface, light intensity patterns on the soil surface are identified by the digital processing of the Landsat 7 ETM image. The NDVI, NDSI, and SAVI indices were also calculated, and the AQI was subsequently obtained using a weighted numerical cross-tabulation. The results show that the NDVI and SAVI indicators are correlated with each other and present a strong and positive classification with the neighborhoods and special areas in which there is a high proportion of vegetation, while the NSI and SAVI indicators are positively correlated with the areas. in which there is a greater proportion of built-up areas and roads. From a comprehensive analysis of the reviewed indicators, the authors derived an environmental quality index that explains the beneficial effects of vegetation and negatively explains the detrimental effects of a city covered in cement.