Improving Forest Carbon Uptake Estimates Using High-resolution Airborne Remote Sensing Data

Abstract

The objective of this project was to collect detailed information on topography and structure of vegetation surrounding three well-established flux towers. Within the EU10-01 project, the NERC Airborne Research and Survey Facility (ARSF) flew surveys over three sites in the Netherlands (2010), in Germany (2010), and in Sweden (2010 / 2011), collecting LiDAR, hyperspectral, and digital aerial photography data at high spatial density. Ecological field data and carbon dioxide and water vapour exchange fluxes were collected at the same time at all three sites. Two Leica GPS Systems (provided by the NERC Geophysical Equipment Facility, GEF) were deployed to these sites in support of the airborne and ground based surveys, providing highly essential GPS base station and rover data during the time of the data collection. Further, the NERC Field Spectroscopy Facility (FSF) provided equipment for calibration of the airborne hyperspectral imagery. The above data has been processed to derive maps of digital elevation, tree height, canopy height, fractional cover of vegetation, and leaf area index.