Terry Sohl
Biography
Terry Sohl is a Research Physical Scientist with the U.S. Geological Survey at the USGS Earth Resources Observation and Science (EROS) Center in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. Since 1993, he has been involved in the mapping, analysis, and modeling of land-use and land-cover within USGS. Terry was one of the team members that helped develop the first 1992 National Land Cover Database (1992) and was also one of the original founders of the USGS Land Cover Trends project. Using the experience gained from mapping and analyzing current and historical land-use change, Terry led the development of the FORE-SCE (FOREcasting SCEnarios of land-use change) modeling framework, which has been used to produce scenario-based land-use and land-cover projections for the conterminous United States at high spatial and thematic resolution. Terry continues to lead land-cover modeling projects at USGS EROS, using a new, parcel-based modeling framework that models landscape change with an unprecedented combination of high spatial resolution, high thematic resolution, broad geographic coverage, representation of both anthropogenic land use and natural land cover change, and use of true land management and ownership boundaries.
Current responsibilities also include the role as Land Resources Mission Area (LRMA) representative for the USGS EarthMAP initiative. In that role, Terry serves on an interdisciplinary team of USGS researchers and managers, helping to coordinate integrated data and science activities related to EarthMAP. He also plays a lead role in coordinating the LRMA collaboration with the Water Mission Area.
More information on the work of his land-cover modeling group at USGS EROS may be found at:
https://landcover-modeling.cr.usgs.gov/
Science and Products
Acquiring Land-Cover Modeling Data from USGS / EROS Center
The following provides a short synopsis of current and recently completely projects using USGS EROS’ FORE-SCE model, and where applicable, links to download data. Additional project information and data will be made available as our research progresses. Please contact the principal investigator for any questions regarding the projects below, or for queries...
Land-cover Modeling at USGS Earth Resources Observation and Science (EROS) Center
Land-use change and the resultant changes in land cover impact a wide variety of ecological processes. Projected land-cover data produced by EROS have been used for a wide variety of applications, including those listed in the left column. The following provides a partial list of published applications for modeled land-use and land-cover data.
Land-Cover Modeling Methodology - The FORE-SCE Model
Many factors determine how human beings modify the earth's landscape. Land-cover change is inherently a local event, yet broader scale socioeconomic and biophysical factors also affect how humans make decisions to use the landscape. Projecting future land cover requires modelers to account for driving forces of land-cover change operating at scales from local ("bottom-up") to global ("top-down...
Spatial Modeling of Land Use, Climate, and Environmental Consequences
USGS scientists have a long tradition of providing high-quality, consistent, and relevant land-cover data for the United States, using our archive of current and historical remote sensing data. Scientists at USGS EROS are using their experience in mapping land cover and their knowledge of land-cover change processes to temporally extend these databases beyond the dates of available remote...
Land Cover Projections
Scientists at EROS look at local and global drivers of land-use change to project how different scenarios will impact and change landscapes. Using the FOREcasting SCEnarios of Land-use Change (FORE-SCE) modeling framework provides spatially explicit projections of future land-use and land-cover change.
Land Cover Trends
Land Cover Trends was a research project focused on understanding the rates, trends, causes, and consequences of contemporary U.S. land use and land cover change. The project spanned from 1999 to 2011. The research was supported by the Climate and Land Use Change Research and Development Program of the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) and was a collaborative effort with the U.S. Environmental...
Building a Decision-Support Tool for Assessing the Impacts of Climate and Land Use Change on Ecological Processes
Scientists, planners, policy makers and other decision-makers in the South Central U.S. want to understand the potential impacts of changes in climate, precipitation, and land-use patterns on natural and cultural resources. Though the potential impacts of climate change can be modeled to help decision-makers plan for future conditions, these models rarely incorporate changes in land-use that...
Remote sensing as the foundation for high-resolution United States landscape projections – The Land Change Monitoring, assessment, and projection (LCMAP) initiative
The Land Change Monitoring, Assessment, and Projection (LCMAP) initiative uses temporally dense Landsat data and time series analyses to characterize landscape change in the United States from 1985 to present. LCMAP will be used to explain how past, present, and future landscape change affects society and natural systems. Here, we describe a...
Sohl, Terry L.; Dornbierer, Jordan; Wika, Steve; Robison, Charles Linking landscapes and people—Projecting the future of the Great Plains
We developed a unique set of landscape projections for the Great Plains that use real land-management parcels to represent landscape patterns at high spatial and thematic resolution.Both anthropogenic land use and natural vegetation respond in the model to projected changes in groundwater availability and climate...
Sohl, Terry L.; Dornbierer, Jordan; Wika, Steve Simulating the effects of management practices on cropland soil organic carbon changes in the Temperate Prairies Ecoregion of the United States from 1980 to 2012
Understanding the effects of management practices on soil organic carbon (SOC) is important for designing effective policies to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions in agriculture. In the Midwest United States, management practices in the croplands have been improved to increase crop production and reduce SOC loss since the 1980s. Many studies of SOC...
Li, Zhengpeng; Liu, Shuguang; Tan, Zhengxi; Sohl, Terry L.; Wu, Yiping
Grand challenges for integrated USGS science—A workshop report
Executive SummaryThe U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) has a long history of advancing the traditional Earth science disciplines and identifying opportunities to integrate USGS science across disciplines to address complex societal problems. The USGS science strategy for 2007–2017 laid out key challenges in disciplinary and interdisciplinary arenas,...
Jenni, Karen E.; Goldhaber, Martin B.; Betancourt, Julio L.; Baron, Jill S.; Bristol, R. Sky; Cantrill, Mary; Exter, Paul E.; Focazio, Michael J.; Haines, John W.; Hay, Lauren E.; Hsu, Leslie; Labson, Victor F.; Lafferty, Kevin D.; Ludwig, K.A.; Milly, Paul C. D.; Morelli, Toni L.; Morman, Suzette A.; Nassar, Nedal T.; Newman, Timothy R.; Ostroff, Andrea C. ; Read, Jordan S.; Reed, Sasha C.; Shapiro, Carl D.; Smith, Richard A.; Sanford, Ward E.; Sohl, Terry L.; Stets, Edward G.; Terando, Adam J.; Tillitt, Donald E.; Tischler, Michael A.; Toccalino, Patricia L.; Wald, David J.; Waldrop, Mark P.; Wein, Anne; Weltzin, Jake F.; Zimmerman, Christian E. Parcels versus pixels: modeling agricultural land use across broad geographic regions using parcel-based field boundaries
Land use and land cover (LULC) change occurs at a local level within contiguous ownership and management units (parcels), yet LULC models primarily use pixel-based spatial frameworks. The few parcel-based models being used overwhelmingly focus on small geographic areas, limiting the ability to assess LULC change impacts at regional to national...
Sohl, Terry L.; Dornbierer, Jordan; Wika, Steve; Sayler, Kristi L.; Quenzer, Robert Grand challenges in understanding the interplay of climate and land changes
Half of Earth’s land surface has been altered by human activities, creating various consequences on the climate and weather systems at local to global scales, which in turn affect a myriad of land surface processes and the adaptation behaviors. This study reviews the status and major knowledge gaps in the interactions of land and atmospheric...
Liu, Shuguang; Bond-Lamberty, Ben; Boysen, Lena R.; Ford, James D.; Fox, Andrew; Gallo, Kevin; Hatfield, Jerry L.; Henebry, Geoffrey M.; Huntington, Thomas G.; Liu, Zhihua; Loveland, Thomas R.; Norby, Richard J.; Sohl, Terry L.; Steiner, Allison L.; Yuan, Wenping; Zhang, Zhao; Zhao, Shuqing A cellular automata downscaling based 1 km global land use datasets (2010–2100)
Global climate and environmental change studies require detailed land-use and land-cover(LULC) information about the past, present, and future. In this paper, we discuss a methodology for downscaling coarse-resolution (i.e., half-degree) future land use scenarios to finer (i.e., 1 km) resolutions at the global scale...
Li, Xuecao; Yu, Le; Sohl, Terry L.; Clinton, Nicholas; Li, Wenyu; Zhu, Zhiliang; Liu, Xiaoping; Gong, Peng Divergent projections of future land use in the United States arising from different models and scenarios
A variety of land-use and land-cover (LULC) models operating at scales from local to global have been developed in recent years, including a number of models that provide spatially explicit, multi-class LULC projections for the conterminous United States. This diversity of modeling approaches raises the question: how consistent are their...
Sohl, Terry L.; Wimberly, Michael; Radeloff, Volker C.; Theobald, David M.; Sleeter, Benjamin M. Modeled historical land use and land cover for the conterminous United States
The landscape of the conterminous United States has changed dramatically over the last 200 years, with agricultural land use, urban expansion, forestry, and other anthropogenic activities altering land cover across vast swaths of the country. While land use and land cover (LULC) models have been developed to model potential future LULC change...
Sohl, Terry L.; Reker, Ryan R.; Bouchard, Michelle A.; Sayler, Kristi L.; Dornbierer, Jordan; Wika, Steve; Quenzer, Robert; Friesz, Aaron M. Climate change and wildfire risk in an expanding wildland–urban interface: a case study from the Colorado Front Range Corridor
Context Wildfire is a particular concern in the wildland–urban interface (WUI) of the western United States where human development occurs close to flammable natural vegetation. Objectives (1) Assess the relative influences of WUI expansion versus climate-driven fire regime change on spatial and temporal patterns of burned WUI, and (2)...
Liu, Zhihua; Wimberly, Michael C.; Lamsal, Aashis; Sohl, Terry L.; Hawbaker, Todd J. Modelling regional land change scenarios to assess land abandonment and reforestation dynamics in the Pyrenees (France)
Over the last decades and centuries, European mountain landscapes have experienced substantial transformations. Natural and anthropogenic LULC changes (land use and land cover changes), especially agro-pastoral activities, have directly influenced the spatial organization and composition of European mountain landscapes. For the past sixty years,...
Vacquie, Laure; Houet, Thomas; Sohl, Terry L.; Reker, Ryan R.; Sayler, Kristi L. Simulating forest landscape disturbances as coupled human and natural systems
Anthropogenic disturbances resulting from human land use affect forest landscapes over a range of spatial and temporal scales, with diverse influences on vegetation patterns and dynamics. These processes fall within the scope of the coupled human and natural systems (CHANS) concept, which has emerged as an important framework for understanding the...
Wimberly, Michael; Sohl, Terry L.; Liu, Zhihua; Lamsal, Aashis
LCMAP Projects Possibilities for Future Land Cover Change
One of the key elements of the U.S. Geological Survey’s (USGS) bold new Land Change Monitoring, Assessment, and Projection (LCMAP) initiative is its potential to project how land cover across the country may change in the future.
USGS Accurately Projects Impacts of Transforming Agricultural Landscapes
When a forest gives way to a potato field, when landscapes once teeming with wheat and barley disappear into seas of switchgrass, there are always implications.
Environmental implications. Economic ones. Land use change can affect local climate. It can alter biodiversity, even the quality of groundwater. Any number of new realities emerge when land—especially that used for agriculture—...