STRUCCHANGE

Monitoring forest degradation using terrestrial lidar and satellite images

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 Obiettivo del progetto (Objective)

'Natural resource managers, policy makers and researchers demand knowledge of deforestation and forest degradation over increasingly large spatial and temporal extents for addressing many pressing issues such as climate change mitigation and adaptation, carbon dynamics, biodiversity, and food security. The scientific community is witnessing a significant increase in the availability of different global satellite derived biophysical data sets (e.g. biomass and surface photosynthesis). However, the use of such data is not supported by accurate in-situ biophysical measurements (e.g. canopy structure) for the monitoring of forest and land dynamics. Consequently, there is an urgent need for methods to measure in-situ canopy structure accurately and better integrate with improved and innovative remote sensing approaches. Major advancements in laser technology and earth observation are offering a revolution in information. An innovative science program is required to fully realise the benefits of these discrete technological advancements. This proposal addresses this need by solving three core challenges. Firstly, methods are developed to retrieve forest canopy structure attributes and biomass using a novel type of ground-based upward-looking laser scanner. Secondly, a physical modelling approach is used which provides a more rigorous framework than prior methods, which largely used regression relationships, to study relationship between the retrieved canopy attributes and satellite data. Finally, these accurate satellite-derived biophysical data sets enable assessment deforestation and forest degradation. However, existing methods to detect changes in satellite data are not able account for seasonal climatic variations. A new approach is therefore proposed to account for seasonality while detecting changes in forest ecosystems. The research efforts are part of a coordinated research activity among groups in Europe, Australia, and USA.'

Introduzione (Teaser)

A coordinated research project between Australia, Europe and the United States has yielded new tools and models for estimating deforestation and forest degradation over time.

Descrizione progetto (Article)

The volume of biophysical data from satellites has expanded massively in the last few years, and the demand for that data has increased. Particularly, there is a need for improved deforestation data on a large spatial as well as temporal scale.

Funded by the EU, the 'Monitoring forest degradation using terrestrial lidar and satellite images' (STRUCCHANGE) project contributed to improving the assessment of deforestation and forest degradation. The project made use of recent advancements in laser technology and Earth observation techniques.

A ground-based laser scanner (known as lidar) was used to develop a new technique for measuring forest canopy structure. This provides more accurate information on forest biomass and other attributes.

Secondly, researchers developed a new modelling framework to study the relationship between canopy attributes measured by lidar and satellite data. Together, this information was used successfully to assess deforestation.

However, researchers found that this method did not take seasonal canopy variation into account. Consequently, they built an algorithm called BFAST to incorporate seasonality into deforestation assessments. The results of this area of work are available on the http://bfast.r-forge.r-project.org/ (project website).

STRUCCHANGE work has been well-received by the scientific community and has generated much international interest. In particular, Google is currently incorporating the project outcomes into a global forest disturbance monitoring tool on its Google Earth platform.