CONCEPTUALIZATION OF URBANIZATION STRUCTURE AND CLIMATE CHANGE IN LAGOS, NIGERIA

Urbanization is synonymous with environmental challenges. In developing countries, the challenges have assumed higher dimensions proportionally due to multifarious issues of rapid changes in the environment, due to development, through population growth and industrialization, and accompanied by all kinds of pollution such as air pollution, waste disposal, land use degradation, and vehicular pollution as the resultant effects of man’s interaction with the environment. The main characteristic effect is the raised temperature of the city centre (UHI) leading to excessive energy use for cooling and putting urban population at great morbidity and mortality risks. This paper literally explores the conceptual framework of interaction between urbanization structure and understanding social impacts of climate change and variability for the evaluation of strategies in the urbanized environment that might serve as adaptive response to climate change. The urbanization structure that affects Lagos state is discussed in relation to the location of the city, the size, the population density, urban geometry, thermal property, air pollution, land use pattern, wind speed and anthropogenic activities. The study revealed that climate change is posing increasing challenges for cities placing greater stress and impacts on multiple social and biophysical systems, including urban infrastructure, water and energy demand simultaneously, followed by a strong global trend towards urbanization of urban poverty. The study concluded that climate change has impacted greatly on virtually all the socio-economic aspects of man