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Demonstrations

Training and demonstration areas

During the first year of the project, algorithms and data combinations were tested in seven sites, six of which were situated in Europe, and one in Peru. During the second year, full-scale demonstrations were conducted.

Three different types of demonstrations were implemented:

  • Local level demonstrations designed to meet private company requirements, and other stakeholders focusing their activities on small areas.
  • Provincial to national level demonstrations aimed primarily at administrative agencies helping to meet their monitoring and reporting requirements, often utilizing National Forest Inventory field sample plots as an integral part of the methodology.
  • Continental level demonstration in Europe, aiming to meet the needs of international organizations and other communities requiring continental level information.

All of the demonstrations used ESA’s Sentinel-1 C-band radar and Sentinel-2 optical satellite data, supported by auxiliary datasets (e.g. digital elevation models, weather data etc.). In addition, JAXA PALSAR-2 L-band radar yearly mosaics were used in the European wide demonstration as well as in Peru.

Demonstration areas

The characteristics of the demonstrations are provided below, with links to openly available prototype output products.

Local level demonstrations

  • Locations: Extremadura (Spain), Ireland, Galicia (Spain), Romania and Styria (Austria)
  • Methods: k-NN or Probability, Autochange and PREBAS
  • Reference data: Field sample plots measured by the users
  • Prototype outputs: User defined selection of forest structure maps, biomass and growth maps and forest change maps for three time-steps with yearly interval (expect in Extremadura 2017 and 2022, and in Styria 2015-2018-2021)
  • Example to the right: Sentinel-2 imagery and above ground biomass estimates in Galicia. Change product 2020-2021, with cleared areas in red. 

Styria prototype output products can be viewed at the ESA Green Transition Information Factory portal.

Local demo example

Provincial to national level demonstrations

regional demo example
  • Locations: Austria, Catalonia (Spain), Finland and Madre de Dios (Peru)
  • Methods: k-NN or Probability, Autochange, PREBAS and Joanneum Researh NRT change detection method (Austria)
  • Reference data: National Forest Inventories and other large scale field plot measurement campaigns
  • Prototype outputs: Selected forest structure and biomass maps (varying between demonstrations) and forest change maps for two years. Near-real-time change mapping in Austria
  • Example to the left: Growing stock volume map for Catalonia 2020.

Catalonia and Finland prototype output products can be viewed and downloaded at the FCM output product portal. Austria outputs can be viewed at the ESA Green Transition Information Factory portal.

Continental demonstration

  • Location: Europe (extended EU)
  • Methods: BIOMASAR and Autochange
  • Reference data: Opportunistic sample of publicly available National Forest Inventory sample plots, supported by LiDAR estimates in selected locations.
  • Prototype outputs: Growing stock volume, above and below ground biomass as well as forest change maps for 2020 and 2021
  • Example to the right: European wide above ground biomass map for 2020, in 20 m spatial resolution. 

Output products can be viewed and downloaded at the FCM output product portal.

Europe demo example