NASA uses satellite lidar technology to study Earth’s forests, key carbon sinks. The GEDI mission maps forest height and biomass from the International Space Station, while ICESat-2 fills polar data gaps. Together, they enable a first-of-its-kind global biomass map, guiding smarter forest conservation and carbon tracking.
00:00One of the things that I love looking at is Siberia, a place I've never been.
00:07It's this vast, vast forest covering so much of that boreal domain that we have almost no data in
00:15because it's really difficult to get there.
00:17But being able to see it in high resolution and zoom in and see what's going on in those parts of the world
00:22that we could never visit by foot, it's really cool and exciting.
00:28Forests play a crucial role in balancing Earth's carbon budget, absorbing and storing roughly 30% of atmospheric carbon.
00:38However, vast regions, like Siberia's boreal forests or the Congo Basin's tropical forests,
00:44have been a mystery because of the obstacles we face in studying them up close.
00:51For over 50 years now, we've been looking at forests from space.
00:56The longest record is from the Landsat program where we have, you know, these high resolution images,
01:02month after month, showing us where there is forest, where we're losing it.
01:08But there's something we still don't fully understand.
01:11How much biomass we've truly lost.
01:14Biomass is the total mass of living things in a given area.
01:19If you were to cut down a tree and dry it, about half of the dry mass of that tree is pure carbon.
01:27So where we've seen historic losses in forest, we haven't known how much carbon was actually lost as part of that.
01:34But in the forestry domain, there is that hope and it's actionable.
01:40Meet JEDI. Mounted on the International Space Station, it's the first satellite LIDAR system specifically designed to measure forests in 3D.
01:52JEDI maps tree canopy height, forest structure, and surface elevation, giving us an unprecedented and incredibly detailed view of Earth's canopy structure.
02:04This allows us to measure biomass and the carbon stored within.
02:08But it has one major limitation.
02:13It had this huge data gap in the boreal because the International Space Station doesn't go over the poles.
02:19So essentially we have amazing data from JEDI over the tropics, over the temperate forests.
02:24But the vast majority of the boreal was just this huge data gap.
02:28That's where ICESat-2 comes in.
02:31We're so lucky right now with the forest LIDAR community that we have ICESat-2,
02:36which was not designed primarily for forests.
02:39The lasers are different, but it's still collecting really useful 3D forest measurements.
02:45ICESat-2 fills in these spatial data gaps by obtaining different measurements at different rates,
02:51giving us a more complete picture of global carbon storage.
02:56So these two LIDAR systems that NASA is currently operating, JEDI and ICESat-2,
03:01they're really quite complementary.
03:03They're in different orbits, and so their transect across the ground is a little bit different.
03:08So it captures different parts and different densities, as you will, within the mid-latitudes.
03:14By combining data from JEDI and ICESat-2, scientists can create a first-of-its-kind global biomass map.
03:22Now we're able to track where carbon is being lost and where it's being regained as forests recover or new trees are introduced.
03:31So then, after we have JEDI and ICESat-2 on orbit, we can assign estimates of how much carbon is being lost or sunk back into those forests as we see them change over time.
03:43So we're uncovering all sorts of forest carbon stories that we've never had the data to do before.
03:52What you want to do is say, like, here's where most of the habitat is for biodiversity, here's where most of the carbon is.
03:58These are the highest priority places for conservation.
04:03These are the best places for potential restoration, right?
04:06So we can use these satellite products to help guide decision-making, but then also provide this check to give us a sense of how well we're doing over time.
04:16Using this knowledge, NASA provides critical insights that help decision-makers take action in protecting and restoring forests, strengthening one of Earth's most biodiverse and carbon-rich ecosystems.
04:31With JEDI and ICESat-2, we're not just looking at forests.
04:35We're seeing a global picture of our planet's carbon cycles, impacts of forest management, changes in forest cover,
04:44and the future of our planet's carbon balance.
04:48We really can make a positive impact there, and we need these NASA missions to do that.
