Anthropogenic heat variation during the COVID-19 pandemic control measures in four Chinese megacities

Anthropogenic heat (AH) is an important input for the urban thermal environment. While reduction in AH during the Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic may have weakened urban heat islands (UHI), quantitative assessments on this are lacking. Here, a new AH estimation method based on a remote sensing surface energy balance (RS-SEB) without hysteresis from heat storage was proposed to clarify the effects of COVID-19 control measures on AH. To weaken the impact of shadows, a simple and novel calibration method was developed to estimate the SEB in multiple regions and periods. To overcome the hysteresis of AH caused by heat storage, RS-SEB was combined with an inventory-based model and thermal stability analysis framework. The resulting AH was consistent with the latest global AH dataset and had a much higher spatial resolution, providing objective and refined features of human activities during the pandemic. Our study of four Chinese megacities (Wuhan, Shanghai, Beijing, and Guangzhou) indicated that COVID-19 control measures severely restricted human activities and notably reduced AH. The reduction was up to 50% in Wuhan during the lockdown in February 2020 and gradually decreased after the lockdown was eased in April 2020, similar to that in Shanghai during the Level 1 pandemic response. In contrast, AH was less reduced in Guangzhou during the same period and increased in Beijing owing to extended central heating use in winter. AH decreased more in urban centers and the change in AH varied in terms of urban land use between cities and periods. Although UHI changes during the COVID-19 pandemic cannot be entirely attributed to AH changes, the considerable reduction in AH is an important feature accompanying the weakening of the UHI.