Understanding the rates and causes of land-use/land-cover (LULC) change helps answer questions about what, where, how, and why the Earth’s surface is changing. Land-surface change results from human activities or natural processes like floods, droughts, and wildfires, and many of these change processes are observable in satellite imagery. The growing historical catalog of satellite images allows scientists to study past LULC changes to better understand where and why changes occur and how human and natural systems respond to them.
The mission of the PLACE (Patterns in the Landscape – Analyses of Cause and Effect) project is to inform land managers, planners, and researchers about historical and current changes to human and natural environments. PLACE focuses on floods, droughts, and fires, which are increasing in severity, extent, and frequency around the globe. Our work is based on the idea that understanding what drives these disturbance events is a necessary step for identifying management practices that can mitigate the negative human and ecological impacts.
Our research is characterized by the following three themes:
Landscape Monitoring
PLACE develops imagery-based approaches to identify and monitor the occurrence of land-cover/land-use change across the United States from 1985-present.
Our publications demonstrate the wide range of monitoring efforts in the PLACE portfolio, as well as how we tailor approaches to different study areas and research questions.
- We start with a thorough review of existing LULC change products to identify gaps in knowledge and to determine the most efficient way forward. The analysis strategy may involve accuracy assessments, visual checks, or the comparison of satellite-derived measures of change to ground-based sources (like stream gages).
- We often test the efficacy of fusing LULC characterization datasets. For example, combining information on fire extents, tree heights, and tree type can be used to estimate biomass loss resulting from fire events.
- We perform analyses across a wide range of spatial scales, from regional extents like California’s Central Valley to national efforts covering the conterminous US. These different perspectives allow us to analyze how rates and causes vary in diverse regions throughout the country. We often use ecological regions or watersheds to separate heterogenous regions
- We rely on cloud-computing and high-performance computation systems to access thousands of satellite images and supply the processing power to create map time series at weekly, monthly, and annual scales.
- We constantly seek incremental improvements in map accuracy by testing both well-established methods as well as newer machine learning approaches.
Causes of Disturbance and Recovery
PLACE explores how climate, human activities, abiotic characteristics, and past disturbances interact to shape the regional variability and magnitude of landscape change. Quantifying the underlying factors that contribute to these sorts of processes helps us understand why landscape changes occur. In the next few years, we will primarily focus on the influence of climatic drivers on select disturbance (flood, drought, and fire) and recovery processes. We are actively working with academic partners on developing robust geostatistical linkages between climate and water, wetland, and fire change patterns.
Impacts of Disturbance
PLACE is involved in investigations related to the ecological and socioeconomic impacts of landscape disturbances and subsequent recovery processes in the United States. The goal is to provide information to stakeholders for enhancing hazard preparedness, quantifying ecological effects, and anticipating the LULC composition of future landscapes.
Two current areas of concentration comprise this objective:
- The investigation of the socioeconomic risks associated with flooding in agricultural areas
- The investigation of wildfire impact on future burn severity potential, smoke emissions, and the character of vegetative recovery
- By looking at how fire intensity varies according to land cover type and number of previous burns, we aim to identify locations where land cover composition is at risk of changing, apply regional recovery signals to identify resiliency across the study area, and shed light on what degree of disturbance leads to different recovery pathways.
Below are multimedia items associated with this project.
Using Google Earth Engine to Generate Monthly-to-Weekly Maps of Surface Water
Our topic will be "Using Google Earth Engine to Generate Monthly-to-Weekly Maps of Surface Water." The presenter will be Chris Soulard with the USGS Western Geographic Science Center.
- Overview
Understanding the rates and causes of land-use/land-cover (LULC) change helps answer questions about what, where, how, and why the Earth’s surface is changing. Land-surface change results from human activities or natural processes like floods, droughts, and wildfires, and many of these change processes are observable in satellite imagery. The growing historical catalog of satellite images allows scientists to study past LULC changes to better understand where and why changes occur and how human and natural systems respond to them.
The mission of the PLACE (Patterns in the Landscape – Analyses of Cause and Effect) project is to inform land managers, planners, and researchers about historical and current changes to human and natural environments. PLACE focuses on floods, droughts, and fires, which are increasing in severity, extent, and frequency around the globe. Our work is based on the idea that understanding what drives these disturbance events is a necessary step for identifying management practices that can mitigate the negative human and ecological impacts.
Sources/Usage: Public Domain.Image properties, image capture frequency, and mission longevity affect what can be observed by different satellites. Satellite images from separate collections provide an opportunity to visualize changing land cover dynamics over time and link mapped changes to underlying causes. This is possible in managed systems like Lake Mead, where changes in surface water levels can be affected by climatic factors that control inflows as well as human decisions that control releases at Hoover Dam.
Our research is characterized by the following three themes:
Landscape Monitoring
PLACE develops imagery-based approaches to identify and monitor the occurrence of land-cover/land-use change across the United States from 1985-present.
Our publications demonstrate the wide range of monitoring efforts in the PLACE portfolio, as well as how we tailor approaches to different study areas and research questions.- We start with a thorough review of existing LULC change products to identify gaps in knowledge and to determine the most efficient way forward. The analysis strategy may involve accuracy assessments, visual checks, or the comparison of satellite-derived measures of change to ground-based sources (like stream gages).
- We often test the efficacy of fusing LULC characterization datasets. For example, combining information on fire extents, tree heights, and tree type can be used to estimate biomass loss resulting from fire events.
- We perform analyses across a wide range of spatial scales, from regional extents like California’s Central Valley to national efforts covering the conterminous US. These different perspectives allow us to analyze how rates and causes vary in diverse regions throughout the country. We often use ecological regions or watersheds to separate heterogenous regions
- We rely on cloud-computing and high-performance computation systems to access thousands of satellite images and supply the processing power to create map time series at weekly, monthly, and annual scales.
- We constantly seek incremental improvements in map accuracy by testing both well-established methods as well as newer machine learning approaches.
Sources/Usage: Public Domain.PLACE uses dense stacks of images to create cloud-free map composites. In this case at the confluence of the Sacramento River and San Joaquin River in California, cloud-free composites include winter inundation and allow the team to measure seasonal surface water variability. The yellow circle highlights where surface water varies the most over the time series. Causes of Disturbance and Recovery
PLACE explores how climate, human activities, abiotic characteristics, and past disturbances interact to shape the regional variability and magnitude of landscape change. Quantifying the underlying factors that contribute to these sorts of processes helps us understand why landscape changes occur. In the next few years, we will primarily focus on the influence of climatic drivers on select disturbance (flood, drought, and fire) and recovery processes. We are actively working with academic partners on developing robust geostatistical linkages between climate and water, wetland, and fire change patterns.
Impacts of Disturbance
PLACE is involved in investigations related to the ecological and socioeconomic impacts of landscape disturbances and subsequent recovery processes in the United States. The goal is to provide information to stakeholders for enhancing hazard preparedness, quantifying ecological effects, and anticipating the LULC composition of future landscapes.
Sources/Usage: Public Domain.The Landsat image pair (tops) show the Thomas Fire, which burned over 230,000 acres in southern California in December 2017.
Sources/Usage: Public Domain.The Thomas Fire led to considerable damage, including landslides that affected structures like this home on Montecito, California. Two current areas of concentration comprise this objective:
- The investigation of the socioeconomic risks associated with flooding in agricultural areas
- The investigation of wildfire impact on future burn severity potential, smoke emissions, and the character of vegetative recovery
- By looking at how fire intensity varies according to land cover type and number of previous burns, we aim to identify locations where land cover composition is at risk of changing, apply regional recovery signals to identify resiliency across the study area, and shed light on what degree of disturbance leads to different recovery pathways.
- Data
- Multimedia
Below are multimedia items associated with this project.
Using Google Earth Engine to Generate Monthly-to-Weekly Maps of Surface Water
Our topic will be "Using Google Earth Engine to Generate Monthly-to-Weekly Maps of Surface Water." The presenter will be Chris Soulard with the USGS Western Geographic Science Center.
- Publications
- News
- Partners