Technology and Forest Carbon Webinar Series
CC-licensed image by Gollob et al. 2021, Remote Sensing (source)
As the last offering in our Fall 2021 Minnesota Forest Carbon Series, we offer three online presentations addressing emerging technologies in forest carbon estimation with an emphasis on lidar, FIA, satellite imagery, and related tools. The three presentations will occur during the same week. All will be recorded, and recordings will be available to all registrants after the series is over. Specific offerings are listed below.
Lower cost and more feasible options to restore forest cover in Minnesota and Wisconsin
Monday November 8, 2021
Susan Cook-Patton, Senior Forest Restoration Scientist, The Nature Conservancy
Restoring forest cover is a prominent option for climate mitigation. However, trees are not appropriate for all locations and effective deployment of this strategy requires knowing where opportunities are and how they vary in carbon capture, costs, co-benefits, and feasibility. This presentation will describe two recent publications and the Reforestation Hub web tool that combine spatial, economic, and feasibility analyses to identify a menu of options for restoring forest cover across the lower 48 states of the United States. These tools are publicly available to help guide policy and implementation efforts at local, state, and national levels.
Measurements to markets: using A.I. to sequester carbon, promote forest stewardship, and democratize ecosystem service markets
Wednesday November 10, 2021
Nan Pond and Brian Clough, Chief Data Scientist and Data Scientist, NCX
Remote-sensing supported datasets are being used to inform new methods for quantifying fire risk, forest inventory, and unlock forest carbon for natural capital marketplaces. This presentation will discuss the history and technology behind the national Basemap dataset from NCX, built in collaboration with Microsoft's AI for Earth program.
Understanding the uncertainty of forest carbon mapping
Friday November 12, 2021 from 9:00 to 10:00am Central
Chad Babcock, Assistant Professor, Department of Forest Resources, University of Minnesota
High-quality maps of forest carbon can greatly improve our ability to manage forests for climate change mitigation. Importantly, the amount of carbon taken up by the forest needs to be accurately monitored over time with statistical rigor. This presentation will demonstrate how to pair state-of-the-art forest carbon maps with forest inventory data to estimate forest carbon. An example approach using US Forest Service-Forest Inventory and Analysis field data and a forest carbon map product developed by NASA Carbon Monitoring System will be shown.
All interested learners are welcome. For accommodations related to ability please contact Eli Sagor at esagor@umn.edu.
