Estimation of Forest Biomass based upon Satellite Data and National Forest Inventory Data

Abstract

This study was carried out to estimate forest biomass and to produce forest biomass thematic map for Muju county by combining field data from the 5 National Forest Inventory (2006-2007) and satellite data. For estimating forest biomass, two methods were examined using a Landsat TM-5(taken on April 28th, 2005) and field data: multi-variant regression modeling and t-Nearest Neighbor (k-NN) technique. Estimates of forest biomass by the two methods were compared by a cross-validation technique. The results showed that the two methods provide comparatively accurate estimation with similar RMSE (63.7567.26ton/ha) and mean bias (1ton/ha). However, it is concluded that the k-NN method for estimating forest biomass is superior in terms of estimation efficiency to the regression model. The total forest biomass of the study site is estimated 8.4 million ton, or 149 ton/ha by the k-NN technique.