Indonesian peatlands are one of the largest near-surface pools of terrestrial organic carbon. Persistent logging, drainage and recurrent fires lead to huge emission of carbon each year. Since tropical peatlands are highly inaccessible, few measurements on peat depth and forest biomass are available. We assessed the applicability of quality filtered ICESat/GLAS (a spaceborne LiDAR system) data t...

The Ice, Cloud and Land Elevation Satellite (ICESat) laser altimetry mission from 2003 to 2008 provided an important dataset for elevation measurements. The quality of GLAS/ICESat (Geoscience Laser Altimeter System) data was investigated for Lake Leman in Switzerland and France by comparing laser data to hydrological gauge water levels. The correction of GLAS/ICESat waveform saturation successf...

During this quarter we have concentrated on the analysis of crossover data in Antarctica from both GLAS laser 1 and laser 2. The results of these analyses are presented below. Thomas Herring gave a talk on ICESat to the faculty of the Department of Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences on the day that Laser 2 was turned on. The talk has been added to the MIT ICESat web page (http://www-gpsg...

[1] The Geoscience Laser Altimeter System (GLAS) on the Ice, Cloud, and land Elevation Satellite (ICESat) provides a globally-distributed data set well suited for evaluating the vertical accuracy of Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM) digital elevation models (DEMs). The horizontal error (2.4 ± 7.3 m) and vertical error (0.04 ± 0.13 m per degree of incidence angle) for the ICESat data used ...

1 Department of Geography, College of Science, Swansea University, Singleton Park, Swansea, SA28PP, UK; E-mails: [email protected] (N.K.); [email protected] (S.O.L.); [email protected] (P.R.J.N.); [email protected] (J.A.B.R.) 2 Centre for Studies of Carbon Cycle and Climate Interactions (LUCCI), Department of Physical Geography and Ecosystem Science, Lund University, Lund,...

ZY-3 is the first civilian high resolution stereo mapping satellite, which has been launched on 9th, Jan, 2012. The aim of ZY-3 satellite is to obtain high resolution stereo images and support the 1:50000 scale national surveying and mapping. Although ZY-3 has very high accuracy for direct geo-locations without GCPs (Ground Control Points), use of some GCPs is still indispensible for high preci...

The Tibetan plateau contains thousands of small and big lakes. Changes in the water level of these lakes can be an important indicator for the water balance of the Tibetan plateau, but were until now extremely difficult to monitor: performing continuous in situ measurements at a large number of lakes is not feasible because of their remoteness, while radar altimetry is only capable of monitorin...

Vegetation height is one of the leading dimensions of ecological variations among tree species and is central to ecosystem functioning [1]. Since its launch in 2003, GLAS (Geoscience Laser Altimeter System) on board ICESat (Ice, Cloud,and land Elevation Satellite) has produced unprecedented dataset at the global scale [2]. However, the challenge to retrieve canopy height from large-footprint sa...

This study explores ICESat/GLAS waveform data in Thuringian Forest, a low mountain range located in central Germany. Lidar remote sensing has been proven to directly derive tree height as a key variable of forest structure. The GLAS signal is, however, very sensitive to surface topography because of the large footprint size. This study therefore focuses on forests in a mountainous area to asses...