Predicting Southeastern Forest Canopy Heights and Fire Fuel Models using GLAS Data

摘要

The Geoscience Laser Altimeter System (GLAS) is a waveform lidar system carried on board the Ice, Cloud, and Elevation Satellite (iCESat). This study tested the use of GLAS data, from the L3e and L3g campaigns, to estimate total canopy height. GLAS footprint locations were sampled for reference data. The GLAS-derived and field-derived canopy heights portrayed good correlation (R~2 = 0.8354). This study also examined two representative fire fuel models within forests in East-Central Mississippi. GLASwaveforms were compared with field data for fire fuel models 9 and 10 of the fire fuel models described by Anderson (1982). GLAS data intensities were extracted and averaged to create predictive variables. Two variables were applied in Logistic regression to predict the probability of belonging to either fuel model (overall accuracy = 0.6875).