Abstract: By using the temperature data at an urban station and three suburban stations and the urban development statistical data in Harbin from 1986 to 2005, the relationship between urban development and heat island effect was analyzed for the past 20 years. The main conclusions are summarized as follows: there was a positive correlation between urban development and heat island intensity in Harbin. The main contributive factors to heat island effect were annual industrial GDP, built-up area, annual power consumption, public transport vehicles, road areas and annual water consumption. The correlation coefficient between synthesized urban development index and annual heat island intensity was 0.72, significant at the 0.01 significance level, and their fit curve generally showed the characteristic of Environmental Kuznets Curve.

Key words: heat island effect, urban development, grey correlation degree, variable weight synthesizing model