Assessing the Impacts of Climate Change on Natural Resources in Erbil Area, the Iraqi Kurdistan Using Geo-Information and Landsat Data

Kurdistan Region of Iraq faces a large-scale semi-aridization of the climate, revealed by the rise of temperatures and the decline of the amount of precipitations, with negative effects visible in the desiccation of vegetation cover and surface water. To quantitatively study this situation, proper methods have been set up, and a retrospective analysis was performed about climate changes and LULCC that occurred in more than two decades (1992–2014) in Erbil Area. Particular attention was devoted to analyze the role of climate change and urban and built-up areas expansion on the degradation of vegetation cover and surface water in this area. The investigation was based both on climate data (temperature and rainfall) acquired from three climate stations available for the whole considered period and on the only two available Landsat satellite images, respectively taken on 28 May 1992 by TM sensor on board Landsat-4 and on 25 May 2014 by ETM+ sensor on board Landsat-7. As regards climate data, spring and summer seasons were mainly affected by temperature increase (20 out 23 years with significant increase with respect to the World Meteorological Organization Standard Normal Period 1961–1990), and spring seasons were mainly affect by rainfall decrease (16 out 23 years with significant decrease with respect to the World Meteorological Organization Standard Normal Period 1961–1990). The vegetation cover was lost for more than 50%, mainly for both these climate change effects (>94%) and for the small remaining part ( 50%) in Erbil district. Similarly, the surface water resources also suffered a strong reduction (>41%) due to the increase of temperatures and decrease of rainfall. Even in a not optimal situation about data availability (only three climatological stations, only two Landsat images), it was more than clear the benefit to combine climate and remote sensing data for monitoring and understanding LULC changes.