Mapping aboveground biomass in Oregon, Washington, Idaho and California with ICESat-2, GEDI and ancillary data

Abstract

Biomass mapping is important for quantifying forest carbon stocks to provide precious insights for climate science and to inform natural resource management, such as fuel treatment planning. In this study, we demonstrated how to utilize Ice, Cloud, and land Elevation Satellite-2 (ICESat-2) and Global Ecosystem Dynamics Investigation (GEDI) data along with other data sources to model and predict biomass for the forests in Oregon, Washington, Idaho and California in 2016 and 2020. The model incorporated the Landsat time series data, GEDI height data, Landscape Fire and Resource Management Planning Tools (LANDFIRE) vegetation data and ICESat-2 derived height data to produce wall-to-wall biomass maps. Results showed that the maps, which are accompanied by corresponding uncertainty maps, have high accuracy. Since two maps are made, there are two validation datasets used in this study. The 2016 and 2020 aboveground biomass density (AGBD) maps were validated with ground plots from the Forest Inventory and Analysis (FIA) program (2016: R2 = 0.769, RMSE = 55.26 Mg/ha; 2020: R2 = 0.572, RMSE = 84.96 Mg/ha). Results describe the reliability of the maps and suggest that the methods proposed in the study could be used to scale up the analysis from regional to national scale. Future studies can include using predictor data from the upcoming National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) Synthetic Aperture Radar (NISAR) mission and new GEDI biomass data, both of which should improve model accuracy.

Citation

Lu, Mei-Kuei; Popescu, Sorin; Malambo, Lonesome; Hudak, Andrew; Lister, Andrew. 2025. Mapping aboveground biomass in Oregon, Washington, Idaho and California with ICESat-2, GEDI and ancillary data. Forest Ecology and Management. 595: 123040.