Thermal Images Of New York City Explain Why Cities Are So Much Hotter Than Neighboring Suburbs

Nickolay Lamm /StorageFront.com,Artist and photographer Nikolay Lamm from self-storage search engine StorageFront.com took pictures of New York City with a thermal imaging camera in order to show the unique temperature structure of urban areas.

In cities, a phenomenon known as the "urban heat island effect" causes air temperatures to be warmer than in nearby suburban or rural areas. There a number of reasons for this, including a large number of buildings and roads that absorb heat from the sun, a lack of plants that cool the air by evaporating water, and even heat generated by lots of human bodies.

The urban heat island effect concerns scientists since warmer air temperatures "can impact air quality, public health and the demand for energy," according to NASA.

Lamm says he was inspired to see the urban heat island effect in action after walking around New York City on a sweltering 95-degree day.

In the following slides, John E. Frederick, a geophysicist from the University of Chicago, helps us to explain what is going on in each image and why.