Burned area in Kalimantan, Indonesia mapped with NOAA-AVHRR and Landsat TM imagery

Fire scars in Kalimantan, Indonesia were mapped using optical and thermal data from the NOAA-AVHRR satellite sensor. Forty-four high-resolution picture transmission images mapped at 1 km spatial resolution were selected for a period immediately after intense biomass burning from October–December 1997. Composite images of the Normalized DiŒerence Vegetation Index (NDVI), surface temperature (ST), and albedowere used to examine the spatial distribution of Ž re scars. Owing to clouds and smoke, 10-week composites of surface temperature, NDVI and albedo were needed to reduce atmospheric eŒects and a range of diŒerent thresholds was applied to the composites to form sets of decision rules involving NDVI, ST, and albedo. The results of each AVHRR Ž re product were checked against a Ž re-scar map derived from a supervised classiŽ cation of a Landsat TM scene. An overall classiŽ cation accuracy of approximately 80% (k 5 0.51) was achieved with criteria ST a > 305 and NDVI a < 0.35, where ST a was the surface temperature and NDVI a was the NDVI at the time of minimum albedo. Application of this decision rule to the portion of Kalimantanwithin the AVHRR window revealed a maximum of approximately 13.18 million ha of Kalimantan, or about 25% of the study area, burned during the latter half of 1997. The results suggest that multiple thresholds of NDVI, ST, and albedo may be used to map burned area in tropical environments similar to those of Kalimantan.