Environmental Monitoring Commons^™

Applications Of Digital Remote Sensing To Quantify Glacier Change In Glacier And Mount Rainier National Parks, Brianna Clark

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Digital remote sensing and geographic information systems were employed in performing area and volume calculations on glacial landscapes. Characteristics of glaciers from two geographic regions, the Intermountain Region (between the Rocky Mountain and Cascade Ranges) and the Pacific Northwest, were estimated for the years 1985, 2000, and 2015. Glacier National Park was studied for the Intermountain Region whereas Mount Rainier National Park was representative of the glaciers in the Pacific Northwest. Within the thirty year period of the study, the glaciers in Glacier National Park decreased in area by 27.5 percent while those on Mount Rainier only decreased by 5.7 …

Toward Closing The Urban Surface Energy Balance Using Satellite Remote Sensing, Joshua Hrisko

Dissertations and Theses

The energy exchanges at the Earth’s surface are responsible for many of the processes that govern weather, climate, human health, and energy use. This exchange, commonly known as the surface energy balance (SEB), determines the near-surface thermodynamic state by partitioning the available energy into surface fluxes. The net all-wave radiation is often the primary energy source, while the heat storage and sensible and latent heat fluxes account for the majority of energy distributed elsewhere. While the SEB of various natural environments(trees, crops, soils) has been well-observed and modeled, the urban surface energy balance remains elusive. This is due to the …

Modeling Gross Primary Production Of Midwest Maize And Soybean Croplands With Satellite And Gridded Weather Data, Gunnar Malek-Madani

Department of Geography: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

The gross primary production (GPP) metric is useful in determining trends in the terrestrial carbon cycle. Models that determine GPP utilizing the light use efficiency (LUE) approach in conjunction with biophysical parameters that account for local weather conditions and crop specific factors are beneficial in that they combine the accuracy of the biophysical model with the versatility of the LUE model. One such model developed using in situ data was adapted to operate with remote sensing derived leaf area index (LAI) data and gridded weather datasets. The model, known as the Light Use Efficiency GPP Model (EGM), uses a four …

Measuring Landfill Methane Emissions Using Satellite And Ground Data, Madjid Delkash, Bowen Zhou, Ramesh P. Singh

Mathematics, Physics, and Computer Science Faculty Articles and Research

Landfill methane emissions (LME) vary in short periods depending upon the meteorological and atmospheric conditions. In this paper, coupling the Atmospheric InfraRed Sounder (AIRS) with the tracer dilution method (TDM) is proposed during unmeasured emission days to have a better annual estimation of the LME. Some assumptions were made to develop this proposed model. The atmospheric model Advanced Regional Prediction System (ARPS) was employed to evaluate assumptions made during emission estimation using the proposed technique. Methane emissions of a landfill for 13 days during 2011–2013 were measured by the TDM and filtered to remove unreliable data. Then, the filtered data …

Reduction Of The Long-Term Inaccuracy From The Avhrr–Based Ndvi Data, Md Zahidur Rahman, Leonid Roytman, M. Nazrul Islam

Publications and Research

This paper investigated the normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) stability in the NOAA/NESDIS Global Vegetation Index (GVI) data during 1982-2003, which was collected from five NOAA series satellites. An empirical distribution function (EDF) was developed to eliminate the long-term inaccuracy of the NDVI data derived from the AVHRR sensor on NOAA polar orbiting satellite. The instability of data results from orbit degradation as well as from the circuit drifts over the life of a satellite. Degradation of NDVI over time and shifts of NDVI between the satellites were estimated using the China data set, because it includes a wide variety …

Accuracy Assessment Of Aqua-Modis Aerosol Optical Depth Over Coastal Regions: Importance Of Quality Flag And Sea Surface Wind Speed, Jacob Anderson

Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Using data collected from 62 coastal stations worldwide from the Aerosol Robotic Network (AERONET) from 2002-2011, accuracy assessments are made for coastal aerosol optical depth (AOD) retrieved from MODIS aboard the Aqua satellite. It is found that coastal AODs (at 550 nm) characterized respectively by the MODIS Dark Land (Land) surface algorithm, the Open Ocean (Ocean) algorithm, and AERONET all exhibit a log-normal distribution. After filtering by quality flags, the coastal MODIS AODs retrieved from the Land and Ocean algorithms are highly correlated with AERONET (with R²≈0.8), but only the Land algorithm AODs fall within the expected error …

Cameras, Satellites, And Surveys: A Multi-Platform Approach To Monitoring Lake Conservation Behavior, Daniel D. Homeier

Honors Theses

Shoreline buffers are essential to maintaining lake water quality and there are numerous methods for their assessment. There is uncertainty in the benefits and drawbacks of different shoreline buffer assessment methods. In this study I explore three methods of remotely assessing shoreline buffers in the Belgrade Lakes Region of Maine: household surveys, geotagged shoreline photos, and satellite imagery. By comparing these three methods I will evaluate their accuracy and applicable scale when used to assess the presence and quality of shoreline buffers.

I used both parametric and non-parametric analysis to (1) evaluate the relative accuracy of 154 household surveys in …

Effects Of Lightning And Other Meteorological Factors On Fire Activity In The North American Boreal Forest: Implications For Fire Weather Forecasting, David Peterson, Jun Wang, Charles Ichoku, Lorraine Remer

Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences: Faculty Publications

The effects of lightning and other meteorological factors on wildfire activity in the North American boreal forest are statistically analyzed during the fire seasons of 2000–2006 through an integration of the following data sets: the MODerate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) level 2 fire products, the 3-hourly 32-km gridded meteorological data from North American Regional Reanalysis (NARR), and the lightning data collected by the Canadian Lightning Detection Network (CLDN) and the Alaska Lightning Detection Network (ALDN). Positive anomalies of the 500 hPa geopotential height field, convective available potential energy (CAPE), number of cloud-to-ground lightning strikes, and the number of consecutive dry …

Impacts Of Meteorological Factors On Modis-Observed Fire Activity In The North American Boreal Forest: The Role Of Lightning, David A. Peterson

Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

The meteorological impact on wildfire activity in the North American boreal forest during the fire seasons of 2000 – 2006 is statistically analyzed through an integration of the following data sets: the MODerate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) level 2 fire products, the 3-hourly 32-km gridded meteorological data from North American Regional Reanalysis (NARR), the instantaneous lightning data collected by the Canadian Lightning Detection Network (CLDN), and the Alaska Lightning Detection Network (ALDN). Positive anomalies of the 500 hpa geopotential height field, convective available potential energy (CAPE), number of cloud-to-ground lightning strikes, and the number of consecutive dry days are found …

The Most Effective Statistical Approach To Correct Environmental Satellite Data, Md Zahidur Rahman, Leonid Roytman

Publications and Research

The proposed paper apply novel statistical approach to correct radiometric data measured by Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometers (AVHRR) onboard the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Polar Orbiting Environmental Satellites (POES). This paper investigates Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) stability in the NOAA/NESDIS Global Vegetation Index (GVI) data during 1982-2003. AVHRR weekly data for the five NOAA afternoon satellites for the China dataset is studied, for it includes a wide variety of different ecosystems represented globally. It was found that data for the years 1988, 1992, 1993, 1994, 1995 and 2000 are not stable enough compared to other years …

Removing Long-Term Errors From The Avhrr Observation Based On Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (Ndvi), Md Zahidur Rahman, Leonid Roytman, Atiqur Rahman, Felix Kogan, Runa Jesmin

Publications and Research

This paper investigates Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) stability in the NOAA/NESDIS Global Vegetation Index (GVI) data during 1982-2003. Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (AVHRR) weekly data for the five NOAA afternoon satellites for the China dataset is studied, for it includes a wide variety of different ecosystems represented globally. It was found that data for the years 1988, 1992, 1993, 1994, 1995 and 2000 are not stable enough compared to other years because of satellite orbit drift, and AVHRR sensor degradation. It is assumed that data from NOAA-7 (1982, 1983), NOAA-9 (1985, 1986), NOAA-11 (1989, 1990), NOAA-14 (1996, 1997), …