Jacques van Oene
November 12th 05, 02:58 PM
Satellites support Kyoto Protocol through forest mapping service
11 November 2005
A prototype service utilising satellites for mapping forests to aid
compliance with the Kyoto Protocol has been endorsed by end users from
European countries - one environmental ministry representative called the
baseline carbon stock information provided a "goldmine".
ESA's Kyoto-Inventory service has been designed to produce information
products on changing land use associated with carbon 'sinks' or 'sources'
that can support national governments' reporting requirements to the Kyoto
Protocol. This three-year demonstration service has now formally ended, but
activities are set to continue under the banner of a broader project called
GSE-Forest Monitoring.
It is generally accepted fact that the global climate is heating up, and
increased human-induced emissions of 'greenhouse gases' - chief among them
carbon dioxide - is the main reason why. The Kyoto Protocol to the United
Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), which entered into
force on 16 February 2005, commits its signatories to limit overall
emissions of these gases.
Developed countries in general are required to reduce their greenhouse gas
emissions by 5% from those during reference year 1990, with the European
Union committed to a reduction of 8%. However the Protocol also includes a
mechanism for offsetting emissions against increases in the stock of carbon
stored in vegetation, in particular forests.
What the Protocol requires for such offsetting to take place is annual
reporting of land use changes - especially afforestation, reforestation and
deforestation (ARD) - associated with shifts in the terrestrial carbon
stock, to be carried out at the national level.
ESA has a long-standing interest in applying Earth Observation to strengthen
the effectiveness of international conventions, so work began on the
Kyoto-Inventory service for land cover mapping, supported through the
Agency's Data User Programme - back in November 2002. Data from satellites
including ERS, Landsat, Proba and SPOT were utilised to produce forest maps,
land use and land use change maps covering 1990, 1997 and 2002 across 200
234 square kilometres of European territory.
Deforestation is being charted
An international consortium led by Italian company Intecs was selected to
implement the service. National end-users responsible for Kyoto reporting
were recruited for product and service definition in Italy, the Netherlands
and Switzerland, with Spain (plus an additional Italian partner - the
Ministry for Agriculture and Forestry, MiPAF) joining during the service
provision stage.
To mark the conclusion of the three-year project, a one-day workshop took
place on 2 November at ESRIN, ESA's Europe Centre for Earth Observation in
Frascati, Italy, attended by staff of institutions responsible for preparing
carbon inventories for Kyoto as well as researchers and experts working in
climate policy and technical issues related to monitoring, reporting and
accounting.
José Romero of the Swiss Agency for the Environment, Forests and Landscapes
(SAEFL - being renamed the Federal Office for the Environment in 2006)
stated he regarded satellite-derived products of this type as key input data
for national greenhouse gas reporting.
Romero added that the 0.5 hectare-resolution land use map produced by
Kyoto-Inv presented an improvement on current information sources, with
service coverage extended across all 41 290 square kilometres of Swiss
territory. He explained that forest in Switzerland was distributed in a
complex and often fragmented way across the country's 26 cantons, with an
individual stand of trees more than 20 metres across and two metres high
being counted as forest.
Validation activities had been carried out by project partner
Agriconsulting, and also checked against the country's detailed
'Arealstatistik' land use map data, compiled once every 12 years.
"We have found in general a good description of different zones, including
differentiating between coniferous and deciduous tree species," Romero said.
"There is some confusion between open forest and grassland, although only
for a small fraction of the area covered." The overall product accuracy
ranged from 90 to 95%.
Jaap Paasman of the Netherlands Ministry of Agriculture, Nature and Food
Quality (Ministerie van Landbouw, Natuur en Voedselkwaliteit, LNV) reported
similar levels of product accuracy for the 41 000 square kilometres of Dutch
forested areas covered by Kyoto-Inventory. He regarded the service not as a
wholesale replacement for the current Netherlands' national system, but a
useful means of improving its quality and reliability.
Paasman added: "The real ESA goldmine - where Kyoto-Inventory fits right
into our current efforts - is the baseline 1990 data it provides, which is
needed to measure subsequent changes in carbon stock."
Antonio Lumicisi of Italy's Ministry of the Environment (Ministero
dell'Ambiente e della Tutela del Territorio, MATT) recounted that
Kyoto-Inventory service coverage ranged across five complete regions of the
country, with very different geographical characteristics and forest types:
Lombardy, Abruzzo, Molise, Toscana and Calabria.
Land use maps for 1989, 1997 and 2002 were produced, with land use change
maps for 1989-1997 and 1997-2002. These products are being validated by
project partner Planetek, with additional, independent validation being
performed by Tuscia University on behalf of the Ministry.
They are being checked against Regional Forest Inventories carried out by
regional administrations as well as the European Commission's CORINE 2000
Land Cover Map, with validation for Molise still to be completed.
Lumicisi reported that results so far showed a thematic accuracy of 89.9 to
94.4%, concluding: "We do believe in the importance of this effort and that
great results can be achieved."
Gerardo Sánchez of the General Directorate for Biodiversity (DGB) of Spain's
Ministry of the Environment (Ministerio de Medio Ambiente, MMA) explained
that the country had begun participating in the processing stage of
Kyoto-Inventory a year ago. Since then forest maps, land cover maps and land
cover change maps across 37 949 square kilometres of territory in the three
provinces of Lleida, Girona and Cacares had been produced.
The products were supplementing the country's ten-yearly National Forest
Inventory effort, data from which was being used for ground truth purposes.
Sánchez declared the products matched user specifications, thanks to the
combined efforts of the processing team and the National Institute for
Agricultural and Food Research and Technology (INIA), consultant to the
Spanish Ministry of Education and Science, which provided precious
territorial knowledge and made good results possible, notwithstanding the
short time Spain was involved in the project with respect to other
countries.
Still some peculiarities of the Spanish regions need improvements, like the
so-called 'dehesas', which are open forest with a 5-15% tree crown cover,
sometimes classified as shrubland. Overall Sánchez pronounced this new
information source as "very helpful", especially for providing a uniform
approach for the whole country, where currently the 17 regions are working
independently with their own methods and no coordination.
The second part of the workshop focused more on the Italian case, and
included speakers from the Italian regions. Enrico Zini of the Regional
Agency for the Protection of the Environment of Lombardy (ARPA Lombardia),
responsible for monitoring the state of the environment for the northern
Italian Region, explained how Kyoto-Inventory products covering Lombardy had
been compared to their own satellite-derived products and other information
sources, to reveal good geometric accuracy and high mapping detail.
In addition the Kyoto-Inventory product had the special strength of being
derived within a short time, making it a "quick" product that is extremely
helpful in areas with a high rate of change, requiring frequent land use
updates.
Next steps within GMES
The Kyoto-Inventory project may be over, but the work continues - and is
being scaled up - within a service called GSE Forest Monitoring. Having
begun in 2003 with a consolidation phase, this October a fully operational
forest and land use monitoring system offering standardised information
products mainly based on Earth Observation has begun.
Rainier Fockelmann of GSE Forest Monitoring project manager GAF AG briefed
the workshop on the project so far. Within Europe, GSE Forest Monitoring has
core users in Austria, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Latvia, Poland,
Russia and Sweden - in addition to the users involved in Kyoto-Inventory -
and is providing pan-European coverage to the European Environment Agency
(EEA).
On a global scale, the service is also working with countries including
Indonesia, Namibia, and South Africa, and includes the evaluation of Clean
Development Mechanism (CDM) afforestation in developing countries.
GSE Forest Monitoring is being carried out as part of the initial portfolio
of services offered through Global Monitoring for Environment and Security
(GMES), a joint initiative between ESA and the European Union to build a
global monitoring capability in support of Europe's environmental and
sustainable development goals.
Kyoto-Inventory and GSE Forest Monitoring results are being jointly
presented to the 8-10 000 delegates attending this month's United Nations
Climate Change Conference in Montreal.
Kyoto-Inventory partners
Led by Intecs, the Kyoto-Inventory consortium comprises Agriconsulting,
Dataspazio, Planetek Italia, the University of Trento and Telespazio - all
from Italy - and NEO BV from the Netherlands.
--
--------------------------------------
Jacques :-)
www.spacepatches.info
11 November 2005
A prototype service utilising satellites for mapping forests to aid
compliance with the Kyoto Protocol has been endorsed by end users from
European countries - one environmental ministry representative called the
baseline carbon stock information provided a "goldmine".
ESA's Kyoto-Inventory service has been designed to produce information
products on changing land use associated with carbon 'sinks' or 'sources'
that can support national governments' reporting requirements to the Kyoto
Protocol. This three-year demonstration service has now formally ended, but
activities are set to continue under the banner of a broader project called
GSE-Forest Monitoring.
It is generally accepted fact that the global climate is heating up, and
increased human-induced emissions of 'greenhouse gases' - chief among them
carbon dioxide - is the main reason why. The Kyoto Protocol to the United
Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), which entered into
force on 16 February 2005, commits its signatories to limit overall
emissions of these gases.
Developed countries in general are required to reduce their greenhouse gas
emissions by 5% from those during reference year 1990, with the European
Union committed to a reduction of 8%. However the Protocol also includes a
mechanism for offsetting emissions against increases in the stock of carbon
stored in vegetation, in particular forests.
What the Protocol requires for such offsetting to take place is annual
reporting of land use changes - especially afforestation, reforestation and
deforestation (ARD) - associated with shifts in the terrestrial carbon
stock, to be carried out at the national level.
ESA has a long-standing interest in applying Earth Observation to strengthen
the effectiveness of international conventions, so work began on the
Kyoto-Inventory service for land cover mapping, supported through the
Agency's Data User Programme - back in November 2002. Data from satellites
including ERS, Landsat, Proba and SPOT were utilised to produce forest maps,
land use and land use change maps covering 1990, 1997 and 2002 across 200
234 square kilometres of European territory.
Deforestation is being charted
An international consortium led by Italian company Intecs was selected to
implement the service. National end-users responsible for Kyoto reporting
were recruited for product and service definition in Italy, the Netherlands
and Switzerland, with Spain (plus an additional Italian partner - the
Ministry for Agriculture and Forestry, MiPAF) joining during the service
provision stage.
To mark the conclusion of the three-year project, a one-day workshop took
place on 2 November at ESRIN, ESA's Europe Centre for Earth Observation in
Frascati, Italy, attended by staff of institutions responsible for preparing
carbon inventories for Kyoto as well as researchers and experts working in
climate policy and technical issues related to monitoring, reporting and
accounting.
José Romero of the Swiss Agency for the Environment, Forests and Landscapes
(SAEFL - being renamed the Federal Office for the Environment in 2006)
stated he regarded satellite-derived products of this type as key input data
for national greenhouse gas reporting.
Romero added that the 0.5 hectare-resolution land use map produced by
Kyoto-Inv presented an improvement on current information sources, with
service coverage extended across all 41 290 square kilometres of Swiss
territory. He explained that forest in Switzerland was distributed in a
complex and often fragmented way across the country's 26 cantons, with an
individual stand of trees more than 20 metres across and two metres high
being counted as forest.
Validation activities had been carried out by project partner
Agriconsulting, and also checked against the country's detailed
'Arealstatistik' land use map data, compiled once every 12 years.
"We have found in general a good description of different zones, including
differentiating between coniferous and deciduous tree species," Romero said.
"There is some confusion between open forest and grassland, although only
for a small fraction of the area covered." The overall product accuracy
ranged from 90 to 95%.
Jaap Paasman of the Netherlands Ministry of Agriculture, Nature and Food
Quality (Ministerie van Landbouw, Natuur en Voedselkwaliteit, LNV) reported
similar levels of product accuracy for the 41 000 square kilometres of Dutch
forested areas covered by Kyoto-Inventory. He regarded the service not as a
wholesale replacement for the current Netherlands' national system, but a
useful means of improving its quality and reliability.
Paasman added: "The real ESA goldmine - where Kyoto-Inventory fits right
into our current efforts - is the baseline 1990 data it provides, which is
needed to measure subsequent changes in carbon stock."
Antonio Lumicisi of Italy's Ministry of the Environment (Ministero
dell'Ambiente e della Tutela del Territorio, MATT) recounted that
Kyoto-Inventory service coverage ranged across five complete regions of the
country, with very different geographical characteristics and forest types:
Lombardy, Abruzzo, Molise, Toscana and Calabria.
Land use maps for 1989, 1997 and 2002 were produced, with land use change
maps for 1989-1997 and 1997-2002. These products are being validated by
project partner Planetek, with additional, independent validation being
performed by Tuscia University on behalf of the Ministry.
They are being checked against Regional Forest Inventories carried out by
regional administrations as well as the European Commission's CORINE 2000
Land Cover Map, with validation for Molise still to be completed.
Lumicisi reported that results so far showed a thematic accuracy of 89.9 to
94.4%, concluding: "We do believe in the importance of this effort and that
great results can be achieved."
Gerardo Sánchez of the General Directorate for Biodiversity (DGB) of Spain's
Ministry of the Environment (Ministerio de Medio Ambiente, MMA) explained
that the country had begun participating in the processing stage of
Kyoto-Inventory a year ago. Since then forest maps, land cover maps and land
cover change maps across 37 949 square kilometres of territory in the three
provinces of Lleida, Girona and Cacares had been produced.
The products were supplementing the country's ten-yearly National Forest
Inventory effort, data from which was being used for ground truth purposes.
Sánchez declared the products matched user specifications, thanks to the
combined efforts of the processing team and the National Institute for
Agricultural and Food Research and Technology (INIA), consultant to the
Spanish Ministry of Education and Science, which provided precious
territorial knowledge and made good results possible, notwithstanding the
short time Spain was involved in the project with respect to other
countries.
Still some peculiarities of the Spanish regions need improvements, like the
so-called 'dehesas', which are open forest with a 5-15% tree crown cover,
sometimes classified as shrubland. Overall Sánchez pronounced this new
information source as "very helpful", especially for providing a uniform
approach for the whole country, where currently the 17 regions are working
independently with their own methods and no coordination.
The second part of the workshop focused more on the Italian case, and
included speakers from the Italian regions. Enrico Zini of the Regional
Agency for the Protection of the Environment of Lombardy (ARPA Lombardia),
responsible for monitoring the state of the environment for the northern
Italian Region, explained how Kyoto-Inventory products covering Lombardy had
been compared to their own satellite-derived products and other information
sources, to reveal good geometric accuracy and high mapping detail.
In addition the Kyoto-Inventory product had the special strength of being
derived within a short time, making it a "quick" product that is extremely
helpful in areas with a high rate of change, requiring frequent land use
updates.
Next steps within GMES
The Kyoto-Inventory project may be over, but the work continues - and is
being scaled up - within a service called GSE Forest Monitoring. Having
begun in 2003 with a consolidation phase, this October a fully operational
forest and land use monitoring system offering standardised information
products mainly based on Earth Observation has begun.
Rainier Fockelmann of GSE Forest Monitoring project manager GAF AG briefed
the workshop on the project so far. Within Europe, GSE Forest Monitoring has
core users in Austria, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Latvia, Poland,
Russia and Sweden - in addition to the users involved in Kyoto-Inventory -
and is providing pan-European coverage to the European Environment Agency
(EEA).
On a global scale, the service is also working with countries including
Indonesia, Namibia, and South Africa, and includes the evaluation of Clean
Development Mechanism (CDM) afforestation in developing countries.
GSE Forest Monitoring is being carried out as part of the initial portfolio
of services offered through Global Monitoring for Environment and Security
(GMES), a joint initiative between ESA and the European Union to build a
global monitoring capability in support of Europe's environmental and
sustainable development goals.
Kyoto-Inventory and GSE Forest Monitoring results are being jointly
presented to the 8-10 000 delegates attending this month's United Nations
Climate Change Conference in Montreal.
Kyoto-Inventory partners
Led by Intecs, the Kyoto-Inventory consortium comprises Agriconsulting,
Dataspazio, Planetek Italia, the University of Trento and Telespazio - all
from Italy - and NEO BV from the Netherlands.
--
--------------------------------------
Jacques :-)
www.spacepatches.info