NASA Workshop for Remote Sensing of Coastal and Inland Waters
EOS meeting report article (PDF)
Coastal and inland water bodies have great value for recreation, food supply, commerce, transportation, and human health and have been experiencing external pressure from direct human activities and climate change. Given their societal and economic value, understanding issues of water quality, water quantity and the impact of environmental change on the ecological and biogeochemical functioning of these water bodies is of interest to a broad range of communities. Remote sensing offers one of the most spatial and temporally comprehensive tools for observing these waters. While there have been some success with remotely observing these water bodies, there still remains many challenges within this system that include algorithm performance, atmospheric correction, the relationships between optical properties and biogeochemical parameters, sufficient spatial and spectral resolution, and a lack of uncertainty estimates over the wide range of environmental conditions encountered across these coastal and inland water bodies.
The workshop will focus on the remote sensing aspects that pertain to environmental change in optically complex coastal and inland lake waters. The scope will be limited to products that can be derived from visible spectral reflectance (i.e. aquatic color) and infrared emissivity (i.e. surface temperature) and the science considerations surrounding these products. The workshop aims to summarize the current state of remote sensing in these complex waters, identify gaps in knowledge and data needs, identify priorities and provide a framework for near- and long-term science goals for remote sensing relevant to the quantification of environmental change in near coastal and inland water bodies. These topics will be reviewed in the context of both U.S. and international science activities. In short, the goals are to:
- Provide an overview of the state of the science.
- Identify pressing needs for the advancement of remote sensing in optically complex waters.
- Establish an inventory of unresolved issues.
- Provide scientific basis/guidance for the next generation of remote sensing of coastal and inland water including a framework and recommendations for future research directions.
- Foster the development of new collaborations.
The workshop will cover topics including, products that are currently able to be retrieved, algorithm refinement and development for improved and desired products, spectral/spatial/temporal limitations and needs, relationships between optical and biogeochemical properties, atmospheric correction, uncertainty considerations, in situ data availability and needs, planning for full utilization of forthcoming sensors with improved spatial, spectral and temporal resolution. Specifically the workshop will aim to address the following research questions:
- 1) What products can be retrieved in coastal and inland water bodies and what are the associated uncertainties with these products across many environmental conditions?
- 2) Do current atmospheric correction and bio-optical inversion schemes work adequately in near coastal and inland regions?
- 3) What variability or deviation is observed in the relationships of optical and biogeochemical properties from those that have been established for the continental shelf or open ocean water?
- 4) What scales of variability (spatial and temporal) are able and not able to be captured with current and planned satellite missions?
We are looking forward to seeing you in Madison in June!
Colleen Mouw, University of Wisconsin-Madison (co-chair)
Steven Greb, Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (co-chair)
Paul DiGiacomo, NOAA NESDIS
Simon Hook, NASA JPL
Chuanmin Hu, University of South Florida
ZhongPing Lee, University of Massachusetts-Boston
Ru Morrison, University of New Hampshire
For more information, contact Maria Vasys.
