Development and Evaluation of a New “Snow Water Index (SWI)” for Accurate Snow Cover Delineation

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Abhilasha Dixit ◽  
Ajanta Goswami
Keyword(s):  
Snow Cover ◽  
Near Infrared ◽  
Accuracy Assessment ◽  
Spectral Characteristics ◽  
Index Theory ◽  
Kappa Statistics ◽  
Water Index ◽  
Snow Water ◽  
Spatio Temporal ◽  
The Individual

<p>The current study started by examining the three most established snow indices, namely the NDSI (normalized difference snow index), S3, and NDSII-1 (normalized difference snow and ice index), based on their capabilities to differentiate snow pixels from cloud, debris, vegetation, and water pixels. Furthermore, considering the limitations of these indices, a new spectral index called the snow water index (SWI) is proposed. SWI uses spectral characteristics of the visible, SWIR (shortwave infrared), and NIR (near infrared) bands to achieve significant contrast between snow/ice pixels and other pixels including water bodies. A three-step accuracy assessment technique established the dominance of SWI over NDSI, S3, and NDSII-1. In the first step, image thresholding using standard value (>0), individual index theory (fixed threshold), histogram, and GCPs (ground control points) derived threshold were used to assess the performance of the selected indices. In the second step, comparisons of the spectral separation of features in the individual band were made from the field spectral observations collected using a spectroradiometer. In the third step, GCPs collected using field surveys were used to derive the user’s accuracy, producer’s accuracy, overall accuracy, and kappa coefficient for each index. The SWI threshold varied between 0.21 to 0.25 in all of the selected observations from both ablation and accumulation time. Spectral separability plots justify the SWI’s capability of extraction and removal of the most critical water pixels in integration with other impure classes from snow/ice pixels. GCP enabled accuracy assessment resulted in a maximum overall accuracy (0.93) and kappa statistics (0.947) value for the SWI. Thus, the results of the accuracy assessment justified the supremacy of the SWI over other indices. The study revealed that SWI demonstrates a considerably higher correlation with actual snow/ice cover and is prominent for spatio-temporal snow cover studies globally.</p>

scholarly journals Development and Evaluation of a New “Snow Water Index (SWI)” for Accurate Snow Cover Delineation

2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (23) ◽  
pp. 2774 ◽  
Author(s):  
Abhilasha Dixit ◽  
Ajanta Goswami ◽  
Sanjay Jain
Keyword(s):  
Snow Cover ◽  
Near Infrared ◽  
Accuracy Assessment ◽  
Spectral Characteristics ◽  
Index Theory ◽  
Kappa Statistics ◽  
Water Index ◽  
Snow Water ◽  
Spatio Temporal ◽  
The Individual

The current study started by examining the three most established snow indices, namely the NDSI (normalized difference snow index), S3, and NDSII-1 (normalized difference snow and ice index), based on their capabilities to differentiate snow pixels from cloud, debris, vegetation, and water pixels. Furthermore, considering the limitations of these indices, a new spectral index called the snow water index (SWI) is proposed. SWI uses spectral characteristics of the visible, SWIR (shortwave infrared), and NIR (near infrared) bands to achieve significant contrast between snow/ice pixels and other pixels including water bodies. A three-step accuracy assessment technique established the dominance of SWI over NDSI, S3, and NDSII-1. In the first step, image thresholding using standard value (>0), individual index theory (fixed threshold), histogram, and GCPs (ground control points) derived threshold were used to assess the performance of the selected indices. In the second step, comparisons of the spectral separation of features in the individual band were made from the field spectral observations collected using a spectroradiometer. In the third step, GCPs collected using field surveys were used to derive the user’s accuracy, producer’s accuracy, overall accuracy, and kappa coefficient for each index. The SWI threshold varied between 0.21 to 0.25 in all of the selected observations from both ablation and accumulation time. Spectral separability plots justify the SWI’s capability of extraction and removal of the most critical water pixels in integration with other impure classes from snow/ice pixels. GCP enabled accuracy assessment resulted in a maximum overall accuracy (0.93) and kappa statistics (0.947) value for the SWI. Thus, the results of the accuracy assessment justified the supremacy of the SWI over other indices. The study revealed that SWI demonstrates a considerably higher correlation with actual snow/ice cover and is prominent for spatio-temporal snow cover studies globally.

scholarly journals Semi-Automatic Fractional Snow Cover Monitoring from Near-Surface Remote Sensing in Grassland

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (11) ◽  
pp. 2045
Author(s):  
Anaí Caparó Bellido ◽  
Bradley C. Rundquist
Keyword(s):  
Snow Cover ◽  
Near Infrared ◽  
Accuracy Assessment ◽  
Important Variable ◽  
Field Station ◽  
Near Surface ◽  
Fractional Snow Cover ◽  
Rgb Images ◽  
Phenological Metrics

Snow cover is an important variable in both climatological and hydrological studies because of its relationship to environmental energy and mass flux. However, variability in snow cover can confound satellite-based efforts to monitor vegetation phenology. This research explores the utility of the PhenoCam Network cameras to estimate Fractional Snow Cover (FSC) in grassland. The goal is to operationalize FSC estimates from PhenoCams to inform and improve the satellite-based determination of phenological metrics. The study site is the Oakville Prairie Biological Field Station, located near Grand Forks, North Dakota. We developed a semi-automated process to estimate FSC from PhenoCam images through Python coding. Compared with previous research employing RGB images only, our use of the monochrome RGB + NIR (near-infrared) reduced pixel misclassification and increased accuracy. The results had an average RMSE of less than 8% FSC compared to visual estimates. Our pixel-based accuracy assessment showed that the overall accuracy of the images selected for validation was 92%. This is a promising outcome, although not every PhenoCam Network system has NIR capability.

scholarly journals Non-Binary Snow Index for Multi-Component Surfaces

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (14) ◽  
pp. 2777
Author(s):  
Mario Arreola-Esquivel ◽  
Carina Toxqui-Quitl ◽  
Maricela Delgadillo-Herrera ◽  
Alfonso Padilla-Vivanco ◽  
Gabriel Ortega-Mendoza ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Spectral Characteristics ◽  
Ice Cover ◽  
Landsat 8 ◽  
Water Index ◽  
Bare Land ◽  
Snow Water ◽  
Precision Assessment ◽  
Normalized Difference Snow Index ◽  
Sentinel 2A ◽  
Water Vegetation

A Non-Binary Snow Index for Multi-Component Surfaces (NBSI-MS) is proposed to map snow/ice cover. The NBSI-MS is based on the spectral characteristics of different Land Cover Types (LCTs), such as snow, water, vegetation, bare land, impervious, and shadow surfaces. This index can increase the separability between NBSI-MS values corresponding to snow from other LCTs and accurately delineate the snow/ice cover in non-binary maps. To test the robustness of the NBSI-MS, regions in Greenland and France–Italy where snow interacts with highly diversified geographical ecosystems were examined. Data recorded by Landsat 5 TM, Landsat 8 OLI, and Sentinel-2A MSI satellites were used. The NBSI-MS performance was also compared against the well-known Normalized Difference Snow Index (NDSI), NDSII-1, S3, and Snow Water Index (SWI) methods and evaluated based on Ground Reference Test Pixels (GRTPs) over non-binarized results. The results show that the NBSI-MS achieved an overall accuracy (OA) ranging from 0.99 to 1 with kappa coefficient values in the same range as the OA. The precision assessment confirmed the performance superiority of the proposed NBSI-MS method for removing water and shadow surfaces over the compared relevant indices.

scholarly journals CrocO_v1.0 : a Particle Filter to assimilate snowpack observations in a spatialised framework

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bertrand Cluzet ◽  
Matthieu Lafaysse ◽  
Emmanuel Cosme ◽  
Clément Albergel ◽  
Louis-François Meunier ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Data Assimilation ◽  
Particle Filter ◽  
Near Infrared ◽  
Snow Water Equivalent ◽  
Sources Of Information ◽  
Average Improvement ◽  
Modelling Uncertainties ◽  
Snow Water ◽  
Spatio Temporal ◽  
Snowpack Properties

Abstract. Monitoring the evolution of the snowpack properties in mountainous areas is crucial for avalanche hazard forecasting and water resources management. In-situ and remotely sensed observations provide precious information on the snowpack but usually offer a limited spatio-temporal coverage of bulk or surface variables only. In particular, visible-near infrared (VIS-NIR) reflectance observations can inform on the snowpack surface properties but are limited by terrain shading and clouds. Snowpack modelling enables to estimate any physical variable, virtually anywhere, but is affected by large errors and uncertainties. Data assimilation offers a way to combine both sources of information, and to propagate information from observed areas to non observed areas. Here, we present CrocO, (Crocus-Observations) an ensemble data assimilation system able to ingest any snowpack observation (applied as a first step to the height of snow (HS) and VIS-NIR reflectances) in a spatialised geometry. CrocO uses an ensemble of snowpack simulations to represent modelling uncertainties, and a Particle Filter (PF) to reduce them. The PF is known to collapse when assimilating a too large number of observations. Two variants of the PF were specifically implemented to ensure that observations information is propagated in space while tackling this issue. The global algorithm ingests all available observations with an iterative inflation of observation errors, while the klocal algorithm is a localised approach performing a selection of the observations to assimilate based on background correlation patterns. Experiments are carried out in a twin experiment setup, with synthetic observations of HS and VIS-NIR reflectances available in only a 1/6th of the simulation domain. Results show that compared against runs without assimilation, analyses exhibit an average improvement of snow water equivalent Continuous Rank Probability Score (CRPS) of 60 % when assimilating HS with a 40-member ensemble, and an average 20 % CRPS improvement when assimilating reflectance with a 160-member ensemble. Significant improvements are also obtained outside the observation domain. These promising results open a way for the assimilation of real observations of reflectance, or of any snowpack observations in a spatialised context.

scholarly journals Quality Assessment of PROBA-V Surface Albedo V1 for the Continuity of the Copernicus Climate Change Service

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (16) ◽  
pp. 2596
Author(s):  
Jorge Sánchez-Zapero ◽  
Fernando Camacho ◽  
Enrique Martínez-Sánchez ◽  
Roselyne Lacaze ◽  
Dominique Carrer ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Surface Albedo ◽  
Near Infrared ◽  
Accuracy Assessment ◽  
Performance Criteria ◽  
Climate Data ◽  
Residual Noise ◽  
Space Agency ◽  
Median Error ◽  
Spatio Temporal

The Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) includes estimates of Essential Climate Variables (ECVs) as a series of Climate Data Records (CDRs) derived from satellite data. The C3S Surface Albedo (SA) v1.0 CDR is composed of observations from National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Very High Resolution Radiometers (AVHRR) (1981–2005), and VEGETATION sensors onboard Satellites for the Observation of the Earth (SPOT/VGT) (1998–2014) and Project for Onboard Autonomy satellite (PROBA-V) (2014–2020), and will continue with Sentinel-3 (from 2020 onwards). The goal of this study is to assess the uncertainties associated with the C3S PROBA-V SA v1.0 product, with a focus on the transition from SPOT/VGT to PROBA-V. The methodology followed the good practices recommended by the Land Product Validation sub-group (LPV) of the Working Group on Calibration and Validation (WGCV) of the Committee on Earth Observing Satellites (CEOS) for the validation of satellite-derived global albedo products. Several performance criteria were evaluated, including an intercomparison with National Aeronautics and Space Agency (NASA) MCD43A3 C6 products. C3S PROBA-V SA v1.0 and MCD43A3 C6 showed similar completeness but had higher fractions of missing data than C3S SPOT/VGT SA v1.0. C3S PROBA-V SA v1.0 showed similar precision (~1%) to MCD43A3 C6, improving the results of SPOT/VGT SA v1.0 (2–3%), but C3S PROBA-V SA v1.0 provided residual noise in the near-infrared (NIR). Good spatio-temporal continuity between C3S PROBA-V and SPOT/VGT SA v1.0 products was found with a mean bias between ±2%. The comparison with MCD43A3 C6 showed positive mean biases (5%, 8%, and 12% for visible, NIR and total shortwave, respectively). The accuracy assessment with ground measurements showed a median error of 18.4% with systematic overestimation (positive bias of 11.5%). The percentage of PROBA-V retrievals complying with the C3S target requirements was 28.6%.

scholarly journals COMPARISON OF VERY NEAR INFRARED (VNIR) WAVELENGTH FROM EO-1 HYPERION AND WORLDVIEW 2 IMAGES FOR SALTMARSH CLASSIFICATION

2016 ◽  
Vol III-8 ◽  
pp. 85-92 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sikdar M.M. Rasel ◽  
Hsing-Chung Chang ◽  
Israt Jahan Diti ◽  
Tim Ralph ◽  
Neil Saintilan
Keyword(s):  
Classification Accuracy ◽  
Near Infrared ◽  
Spatial Information ◽  
Spectral Characteristics ◽  
Atmospheric Correction ◽  
Remote Sensing Data ◽  
Principal Component ◽  
Kappa Statistics ◽  
Significant Difference ◽  
Hyperion Data

Saltmarsh is one of the important communities of wetlands. Due to a range of pressures, it has been declared as an EEC (Ecological Endangered Community) in Australia. In order to correctly identify different saltmarsh species, development of distinct spectral characteristics is essential to monitor this EEC. This research was conducted to classify saltmarsh species based on spectral characteristics in the VNIR wavelength of Hyperion Hyperspectral and Worldview 2 multispectral remote sensing data. Signal Noise Ratio (SNR) and Principal Component Analysis (PCA) were applied in Hyperion data to test data quality and to reduce data dimensionality respectively. FLAASH atmospheric correction was done to get surface reflectance data. Based on spectral and spatial information a supervised classification followed by Mapping Accuracy (%) was used to assess the classification result. SNR of Hyperion data was varied according to season and wavelength and it was higher for all land cover in VNIR wavelength. There was a significant difference between radiance and reflectance spectra. It was found that atmospheric correction improves the spectral information. Based on the PCA of 56 VNIR band of Hyperion, it was possible to segregate 16 bands that contain 99.83 % variability. Based on reference 16 bands were compared with 8 bands of Worldview 2 for classification accuracy. Overall Accuracy (OA) % for Worldview 2 was increased from 72 to 79 while for Hyperion, it was increased from 70.47 to 71.66 when bands were added orderly. Considering the significance test with z values and kappa statistics at 95% confidence level, Worldview 2 classification accuracy was higher than Hyperion data.

scholarly journals CrocO_v1.0: a particle filter to assimilate snowpack observations in a spatialised framework

2021 ◽  
Vol 14 (3) ◽  
pp. 1595-1614
Author(s):  
Bertrand Cluzet ◽  
Matthieu Lafaysse ◽  
Emmanuel Cosme ◽  
Clément Albergel ◽  
Louis-François Meunier ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Data Assimilation ◽  
Particle Filter ◽  
Near Infrared ◽  
Snow Water Equivalent ◽  
Sources Of Information ◽  
Average Improvement ◽  
Modelling Uncertainties ◽  
Snow Water ◽  
Spatio Temporal ◽  
Snowpack Properties

Abstract. Monitoring the evolution of snowpack properties in mountainous areas is crucial for avalanche hazard forecasting and water resources management. In situ and remotely sensed observations provide precious information on the state of the snowpack but usually offer limited spatio-temporal coverage of bulk or surface variables only. In particular, visible–near-infrared (Vis–NIR) reflectance observations can provide information about the snowpack surface properties but are limited by terrain shading and clouds. Snowpack modelling enables the estimation of any physical variable virtually anywhere, but it is affected by large errors and uncertainties. Data assimilation offers a way to combine both sources of information and to propagate information from observed areas to non-observed areas. Here, we present CrocO (Crocus-Observations), an ensemble data assimilation system able to ingest any snowpack observation (applied as a first step to the height of snow (HS) and Vis–NIR reflectances) in a spatialised geometry. CrocO uses an ensemble of snowpack simulations to represent modelling uncertainties and a particle filter (PF) to reduce them. The PF is prone to collapse when assimilating too many observations. Two variants of the PF were specifically implemented to ensure that observational information is propagated in space while tackling this issue. The global algorithm ingests all available observations with an iterative inflation of observation errors, while the klocal algorithm is a localised approach performing a selection of the observations to assimilate based on background correlation patterns. Feasibility testing experiments are carried out in an identical twin experiment setup, with synthetic observations of HS and Vis–NIR reflectances available in only one-sixth of the simulation domain. Results show that compared against runs without assimilation, analyses exhibit an average improvement of the snow water equivalent continuous rank probability score (CRPS) of 60 % when assimilating HS with a 40-member ensemble and an average 20 % CRPS improvement when assimilating reflectance with a 160-member ensemble. Significant improvements are also obtained outside the observation domain. These promising results open a possibility for the assimilation of real observations of reflectance or of any snowpack observations in a spatialised context.

scholarly journals A NEW MULTI-SPECTRAL THRESHOLD NORMALIZED DIFFERENCE WATER INDEX (MST-NDWI) WATER EXTRACTION METHOD – A CASE STUDY IN YANHE WATERSHED

2018 ◽  
Vol XLII-3 ◽  
pp. 2557-2564
Author(s):  
Y. Zhou ◽  
H. Zhao ◽  
H. Hao ◽  
C. Wang
Keyword(s):  
Extraction Method ◽  
Accuracy Assessment ◽  
Spectral Characteristics ◽  
Water System ◽  
Landsat Tm ◽  
Water Extraction ◽  
Water Volume ◽  
Threshold Segmentation ◽  
Water Index ◽  
Normalized Difference Water Index

Accurate remote sensing water extraction is one of the primary tasks of watershed ecological environment study. Since the Yanhe water system has typical characteristics of a small water volume and narrow river channel, which leads to the difficulty for conventional water extraction methods such as Normalized Difference Water Index (NDWI). A new Multi-Spectral Threshold segmentation of the NDWI (MST-NDWI) water extraction method is proposed to achieve the accurate water extraction in Yanhe watershed. In the MST-NDWI method, the spectral characteristics of water bodies and typical backgrounds on the Landsat/TM images have been evaluated in Yanhe watershed. The multi-spectral thresholds (TM1, TM4, TM5) based on maximum-likelihood have been utilized before NDWI water extraction to realize segmentation for a division of built-up lands and small linear rivers. With the proposed method, a water map is extracted from the Landsat/TM images in 2010 in China. An accuracy assessment is conducted to compare the proposed method with the conventional water indexes such as NDWI, Modified NDWI (MNDWI), Enhanced Water Index (EWI), and Automated Water Extraction Index (AWEI). The result shows that the MST-NDWI method generates better water extraction accuracy in Yanhe watershed and can effectively diminish the confusing background objects compared to the conventional water indexes. The MST-NDWI method integrates NDWI and Multi-Spectral Threshold segmentation algorithms, with richer valuable information and remarkable results in accurate water extraction in Yanhe watershed.

scholarly journals COMPARISON OF VERY NEAR INFRARED (VNIR) WAVELENGTH FROM EO-1 HYPERION AND WORLDVIEW 2 IMAGES FOR SALTMARSH CLASSIFICATION

2016 ◽  
Vol III-8 ◽  
pp. 85-92
Author(s):  
Sikdar M.M. Rasel ◽  
Hsing-Chung Chang ◽  
Israt Jahan Diti ◽  
Tim Ralph ◽  
Neil Saintilan
Keyword(s):  
Classification Accuracy ◽  
Near Infrared ◽  
Spatial Information ◽  
Spectral Characteristics ◽  
Atmospheric Correction ◽  
Remote Sensing Data ◽  
Principal Component ◽  
Kappa Statistics ◽  
Significant Difference ◽  
Hyperion Data

Saltmarsh is one of the important communities of wetlands. Due to a range of pressures, it has been declared as an EEC (Ecological Endangered Community) in Australia. In order to correctly identify different saltmarsh species, development of distinct spectral characteristics is essential to monitor this EEC. This research was conducted to classify saltmarsh species based on spectral characteristics in the VNIR wavelength of Hyperion Hyperspectral and Worldview 2 multispectral remote sensing data. Signal Noise Ratio (SNR) and Principal Component Analysis (PCA) were applied in Hyperion data to test data quality and to reduce data dimensionality respectively. FLAASH atmospheric correction was done to get surface reflectance data. Based on spectral and spatial information a supervised classification followed by Mapping Accuracy (%) was used to assess the classification result. SNR of Hyperion data was varied according to season and wavelength and it was higher for all land cover in VNIR wavelength. There was a significant difference between radiance and reflectance spectra. It was found that atmospheric correction improves the spectral information. Based on the PCA of 56 VNIR band of Hyperion, it was possible to segregate 16 bands that contain 99.83 % variability. Based on reference 16 bands were compared with 8 bands of Worldview 2 for classification accuracy. Overall Accuracy (OA) % for Worldview 2 was increased from 72 to 79 while for Hyperion, it was increased from 70.47 to 71.66 when bands were added orderly. Considering the significance test with z values and kappa statistics at 95% confidence level, Worldview 2 classification accuracy was higher than Hyperion data.

scholarly journals SPATIO-TEMPORAL ANALYSIS OF URBAN HEAT ISLAND IN MANDAUE CITY, PHILIPPINES

2019 ◽  
Vol XLII-4/W19 ◽  
pp. 361-367
Author(s):  
A. M. Rejuso ◽  
A. C. Cortes ◽  
A. C. Blanco ◽  
C. A. Cruz ◽  
J. B. Babaan
Keyword(s):  
Land Surface ◽  
Vegetation Index ◽  
Near Infrared ◽  
Normalized Difference Vegetation Index ◽  
Temporal Analysis ◽  
High Heat ◽  
Temporal Variations ◽  
The Philippines ◽  
Water Index ◽  
Spatio Temporal

Abstract. Extensive urbanization alters the natural landscape as vegetation were replaced with infrastructures composed of materials with low albedo and high heat capacity often resulting to increase in land surface temperatures (LST). The present study focused on the spatial and temporal variations of LST in Mandaue City, one of the metropolitan cities in the Philippines that had undergone a rapid rate of urbanization over the past years. Climate Engine (CE), a cloud computing tool that processes satellite images, was used in this study. Preprocessed LST, normalized difference water index (NDWI), normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI), shortwave infrared (SWIR 1) and near-infrared (NIR) layers were directly downloaded from CE while the normalized difference built-up index (NDBI) maps were calculated. Time-series dataset of these indices were analyzed to determine the impacts of reduced vegetation cover and increased built-up areas on surface temperature from years 2013 to 2019. The spatial distribution of LST were analyzed using Univariate Local Moran’s I in GeoDa to identify hotspots within the city. Analysis results showed that the hotspots are barangays Tipolo (100%), Bakilid (100%), Ibabao-Estancia (93.5%), Alang-Alang (87.2%), Guizo (84.4%), Subangdaku (84.1%), and Centro (79.4%). The results indicated that there is a linear relationship between LST and NDBI (r = 0.659, p < 0.01) while an inverse relationship was observed between LST with NDVI (r = −0.527, p < 0.1) and NDWI (r = −0.620, p < 0.01).

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