Comparison of Aviris and AISA Airborne Hyperspectral Sensing for Above-Ground Forest Carbon Mapping

Monitoring of the 418 million ha of forests in Canada is needed to ensure the sustainable development of these forests. Hyperspectral sensing can provide mapping of forest species, forest health, and above-ground biomass. Airborne two-meter AISA hyperspectral and LIDAR data were acquired by the University of Victoria (UVic) over the Greater Victoria Watershed District (GVWD) test site and compared to NASA's AVIRIS data that had been acquired in the summer of 2002 at 4 m spatial resolution. Tree heights derived from LIDAR data, and allometric equations were used to provide independent ground estimates of biomass. Between-sensor calibration calibrated the AISA data to the same basis as the AVIRIS data. The calibrated reflectance data were used to generate forest species classifications, and biomass estimates for the test site. Average classification accuracies exceeded 89% in mapping major forest species. These products were used to create a map of above-ground carbon for the forested portion of the GVWD test site.