Publisher:Pasadena, CA: Jet Propulsion Laboratory, National Aeronautics and Space Administration, 2017
Citation:2017 IEEE International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium, Fort Worth, Texas, July 23-28, 2017
Abstract:
Spaceborne SAR interferometry (InSAR) has the potential of
detecting forest change on a global scale with fine (meter-level)
spatial resolution as well as on a monthly/weekly basis under all
weather conditions. This is significant to characterize the land use
change and its impact on climate change. In this paper, both
single-pass and repeat-pass SAR interferometry from spaceborne
sensors are combined in order to detect and quantify (with
Normalized RMSE 30%) forest disturbance at a large scale
(dozens of kilometers) however with a fine spatial resolution (<
1 hectare) based on two newly developed approaches. The singlepass
InSAR approach is not only able to detect forest disturbance
but also capable of characterizing meter (or even sub-meter)
level change of forest phase-center (mean) height due to forest
growth and/or degradation. The methodology described in this
paper can be considered as complimentary tools and thus can be
combined with the existing PolInSAR technique (that has been
widely used for retrieving forest height from single-pass SAR
interferometry). These methods are extensively validated with the
past and current spaceborne single-pass and repeat-pass InSAR
missions (i.e. JAXA’s ALOS-1, ALOS-2 and DLR’s TanDEM-X)
over subtropical forests in Australia as well as tropical forests
in Brazil. Such techniques also serve as observing prototypes for
the fusion of the future spaceborne InSAR missions (such as
NASA-ISRO’s NISAR and DLR’s TanDEM-L).