Exploratory: generated automatically from the UmaTerra platforms' data; not independently validated or peer reviewed.

UmaTerra · story Português
Science · Climate · Vitória

Vitória: Greater Vitória, the north coast and the Espírito Santo mountains, read with one ruler

Six INMET stations in three regions: Greater Vitória (Vitória and Vila Velha), the north coast (Linhares and São Mateus) and the mountains (Santa Teresa and Venda Nova do Imigrante). What they and the satellite record: land use from 1985 to 2025, temperature and rain from 2000 to 2025, the surface heat island, the landslide and flooding risks read separately, the biodiversity recorded in GBIF, and protected areas. The series have different lengths, and the story shows where the reading is firm and where it is only a clue.

How to cite: Biondo, Leandro M. (2026). Vitória: Greater Vitória, the north coast and the Espírito Santo mountains, read with one ruler. UmaTerra. https://umaterra.com.br/en/stories/vitoria/

Loading the numbers…

—INMET stations used, in 3 regions measured
—change in urban area within 5 km of the metro-region stations, 1985–2025 measured
—°C of night-time surface heat island in the metro region, mean 2001–2025 measured
—years of valid data on the coast measured

measured by INMET, MapBiomas, MODIS, SRTM, GBIF or WDPA. estimated a reading that depends on a choice (a threshold, a buffer, a model). missing a part that did not respond this time.

1

Where the stations are

Greater Vitória, the north coast and the mountains each have a different set of INMET stations, with series of different lengths. Pick a region to frame the map. Alfredo Chaves and Ecoporanga lie outside the regions; Afonso Cláudio has a short series.

2

Forty years of land use, drag the bar

On the left, land use in 1985; on the right, in 2025, from MapBiomas’ annual mapping (Collection 11). The bar shows the same area at both dates: what changes shows along the line.

3

Four readings of the same territory

The buttons switch the layer on the map: land use in 2025, slope above 20°, valley floors, up to 10 m above the nearest river (HAND), and night surface temperature, mean 2016 to 2025. Each answers a different question, and none adds the others.

4

The four regions side by side

Same legend, same frame size. In Greater Vitória the city grows over farmland and pasture; on the north coast, urbanisation moves into farmland; in the mountains, forest grows and farming retreats.

5

Each place: the slider, the rings and the flow

Pick a station. The map shows its 5 km disc at both dates, with the bar between them. Below, the composition in rings of 1, 2, 5 and 10 km shows whether the change stays near the station or reaches farther. The flow diagram (sankey) shows where each 1985 class went.

6

Click a station, or choose one, and see its series

Each station has its own annual series of temperature, rain and apparent temperature, from months with at least 80% of data. The chart shows the chosen station’s series and its trend with the statistical test.

7

What changes in each region

To compare regions whose stations have different years, each station is compared with its own mean, and the mean of those differences becomes the regional line. Choose the variable.

8

The heat island, year by year

The difference between surface temperature in a 5 km disc and in a 20 to 30 km ring around each station, measured by MODIS. Drag the year and switch between day and night. Surface temperature is not air temperature, and the ring includes lowland and sea.

9

Landslide and flooding are not the same sum

Landslide depends mostly on relief; flooding depends on valley floors and the city. Regional heavy rain weighs on both, but it does not enter as a class in either. Choose the risk to see its layer and the table for each station. The class thresholds are choices, not measurements.

10

Who records biodiversity, and how much

Species records published in GBIF for each region and in 5 km discs around each station. Beyond volume, the table shows who sends them: how much of the output comes from the ten and the hundred most active names, and whether the observation is human or from collections.

11

How much of each region is in protected areas

The World Database on Protected Areas (WDPA, from UNEP-WCMC and IUCN), inside each region, and the forest of 1985 and 2025 inside and outside them. The comparison shows where the forest is; it does not measure the effect of protection.

12

Support and counterpoint in the literature

Sources on Vitória are one-off studies of satellite surface temperature and urban thermal field, with heat islands in the built-up area and the effect of vegetation. The sources we read do not include a long air-temperature series for the city. Our 2006–2025 data show a rise in maximum temperature without statistical significance, and more dry months in Greater Vitória at the edge of the test.

13

Muggy night: heat with no relief

In Vitória the discomfort is the muggy night, and many people say there is no relief after sunset. The Greater Vitória minimum shows no significant trend; humidity, which weighs on that feeling, is not part of this story.

14

The UmaTerra tools, and what each added

This reading uses three tools from the platform. If you research or write a report on an area, each can feed your work: biodiversity through GBIF, protected areas, and each place’s image through land use.

umaterra.com.br · Vitória
Loading…measured
Loading the numbers…

What this story does not say

The same question in three metros: Houston, Goiânia and Kelowna → And a mountain region with another winter: the Okanagan → The same ruler in Rio de Janeiro: lakes, mountains and lowland →

Written with Claude, by Anthropic, from INMET, MapBiomas, MODIS, SRTM, GBIF and WDPA data read through Earth Engine, the climate-shift database and UmaTerra’s own tools, and from the sources cited. No number was typed by hand: each comes from the builders in the story’s working folder.

References

  1. Stations: INMET, stations table of the climate-shift database (6 stations in 3 regions; Alfredo Chaves and Ecoporanga lie outside the regions; Afonso Cláudio has a short series). Monthly series: monthly_summary_comprehensive table, with the completeness ratio of each month.
  2. MapBiomas Collection 11, annual land-use mapping of Brazil, 1985–2025, read through Earth Engine (mapbiomas_brazil_collection11_coverage_v3). Brazil: brasil.mapbiomas.org.
  3. Holz, Lorena & Marchioro (urban thermal field of Vitória, cited in a search; check the reference). Caminhos de Geografia (UFU) article on surface temperature and atmospheric systems in Vitória: seer.ufu.br/…/26984 (in Portuguese). Read from the abstract.
  4. Steadman, R. G. (1994). Norms of apparent temperature in Australia. Australian Meteorological Magazine, 43, 1–16. Used in its simplified form (monthly mean temperature, humidity and wind); it is an approximation, not the official heat index. (Check the title and volume.)
  5. Wan, Z.; Hook, S.; Hulley, G. (2021). MOD11A2 MODIS/Terra Land Surface Temperature/Emissivity 8-Day L3 Global 1km, v061. DOI 10.5067/MODIS/MOD11A2.061. Surface temperature, not air temperature.
  6. Farr, T. G. et al. (2007). The Shuttle Radar Topography Mission. Reviews of Geophysics 45, RG2004. DOI 10.1029/2005RG000183. 30 m relief (SRTM, USGS/SRTMGL1_003). Slope and valley floors are proxies, not a susceptibility map.
  7. Literature cited in the text:
    • Caminhos de Geografia (UFU). Influence of atmospheric systems on surface temperature in Vitória (ES). link (in Portuguese). Read from the abstract.
    • UFES. Identification and analysis of the urban heat island phenomenon in the municipality of Vitória, ES. dspace5.ufes.br/handle/10/19912 (in Portuguese). Check authorship and year.
    • Research, Society and Development (2020). Surface temperature with Landsat-8 in Vitória: lower NDVI with higher temperatures, except over the ocean. link (in Portuguese). Read from the abstract.
    • Zandonadi (2025), UFES dissertation on vegetation distribution and microclimates in Vitória (cited in a search; check).
  8. GBIF.org. GBIF Occurrence Search API, aggregated counts (facets) of published records, 2000–2025, in each region’s box and in 5 km discs around the stations, queried with Naturametrics’ GBIF tool. Counts of published records, not field effort. gbif.org.
  9. UNEP-WCMC and IUCN. Protected Planet: the World Database on Protected Areas (WDPA), current polygons (WCMC/WDPA/current/polygons) read through Earth Engine, for Brazil, inside each region’s box. Declared area (REP_AREA), not measured. protectedplanet.net.
  10. UmaTerra tools used in this story: Naturametrics (GBIF tool), Yvynation (protected lands, same path as WDPA) and Camposcope (rural property analysis, not used in this version).