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Observation
of Amazon Rainforest by Japanese Earth observation satellite
ALOS (*1) |
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The 13th Conference of Parties (COP13) of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCC) was held in Bali, Indonesia from December 3 to 14, 2007. "Forest Day" organized by the Indonesia Ministry of
Forest (MOF) and Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR)
was set up on December 8 during the period of the conference,
and a side event was held called "Sustainable management
of Forests and Carbon: Modeling, Monitoring, and Accounting for
Forests and Carbon," which was organized by the Forest Agency
of Japan and the Global Environment Facility (GEF). As one of the presentations, Dr. Masanobu Shimada, Research
Field Leader of Japan Exploration Agency (JAXA) along with Dr.
Ake Rosenqvist, from the European Commission of Joint Research
Center gave a presentation on the efficiency of techniques for
observing the Amazon Rainforest that use PALSAR(*2) data from
ALOS. JAXA announced that it started supplying PALSAR images from ALOS to the Brazilian Institute of Environment and Renewable Natural Resources (IBAMA) on September 3, 2007. Dr. Shimada said "PALSAR is an L-band microwave sensor to receive microwaves that, because they have a long wavelength of 23.6 cm, can penetrate through cloud and rainfall and acquire image data regardless of the weather or the time of day. They can also partially penetrate forest and go through to the ground. Therefore, PALSAR is suitable for observing the Amazon Rainforest which is very cloudy in the rainy season. Mastering the technique of analyzing PALSAR image data is also very useful for observing illegal logging activities and can help to prevent deforestation." Amazon
Deforest Watch (Santarem) JERS-1 & ALOS (PDF 8.18MB)
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