Abstract:
In this study, the hourly air temperature differences between City hall (urban) and Okoafo
(rural) in Lagos, Nigeria, were calculated using one year of meteorological observations, from June
2014 to May 2015. The two sites considered for this work were carefully selected to represent their
climate zones. The city core, City hall, is within the Local Climate Zone (LCZ 2) (Compact midrise)
while the rural location, Okoafo, falls within LCZ B (Scattered Trees) in the south-western part on
the outskirt of the city. This study is one of very few to investigate urban temperature conditions
in Lagos, the largest city in Africa and one of the most rapidly urbanizing megacities in the world;
findings show that maximum nocturnal UHI magnitudes in Lagos can exceed 7 C during the dry
season, and during the rainy season, wet soils in the rural environment supersede regional wind
speed as the dominant control over UHI magnitude.
