Application of HJ/IRS to retrieve water surface temperature in Lake Taihu, China

Water surface temperature(WST) is an important parameter in aquatic ecology and environment. The WST in Lake Taihu has a good relationship with the algae bloom. Thermal infrared remote sensing will provide a effective tool for detecting the WST. China HJ satellite is another satellite monitoring environment pollution and natural disasters which is subsequent to China FY, CBERS and HY satellite launched. With HJ/IRS images, the WST in Lake Taihu is retrieved by a generalized single channel algorithm. The results show that the retrieval accuracy of HJ/IRS image is above 1 in Lake Taihu. As its high spatial and temporal resolution, HJ/IRS image is desirable to use for retrieving temperature of land waters. The WST in Lake Taihu can occur constantly spatial and temporal change. The WST is various in the different area, which can be due to the direction and velocity of water current. And the WST is always higher in the surrounding area than in the centre. This may result from the effect of inlands climate.