A Global Forest Height and Biomass Product from ICESat
Michael
Lefsky, Colorado State University, lefsky@cnr.colostate.edu
(Presenting)
Michael
Keller, International Institute of Tropical Forestry and University of New Hampshire, michael@kaos.sr.unh.edu
David
Harding, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, michael@kaos.sr.unh.edu
Lidar sensors generally have been deployed on airborne platforms for short observational campaigns, limiting the scale of scientific questions that could be approached. With the data already collected by the Geoscience Laser Altimeter System (GLAS), we have the ability to move lidar remote sensing from the proof-of-concept stage to regional and global applications in forest ecology, forest management and carbon cycle science. Nevertheless, the translation of GLAS data from the realm of specialists, to part of the toolbox regularly used by remote sensing and carbon cycle scientists is impeded by two barriers: the technical difficulty of working with the data, and the lack of work scaling up existing approaches to regional and global scales.
Where substantial ground slope is present, GLAS waveforms over-estimate canopy height due to the broadened distribution of returns from the ground surface. A robust method for removing these effects has been developed that uses both metrics derived from the GLAS waveforms themselves, as well as ancillary data from Shuttle Radar Topographic mission. The results of this analysis, as well as the overall objectives and plans for data distribution will be discussed.