AresysAresysEuropean Space AgencyEuropean Space Agency

2. BPS and Forest Disturbance Products Overview#

BIOMASS is a fully polarimetric SAR mission with its radar instrument relying on a single imaging mode, being Stripmap (SM), declined into 3 different swaths (S1, S2, S3) to achieve the global coverage.

The Forest Disturbance product family is composed by:

  • Level-2a (L2a): product composed by three stack-based images with different resolution and projection (latitude-longitude) with respect to the L1c source data:

    • one image representing the probability of change at a given Global cycle, obtained from L1c processing and auxiliary data;

    • one image representing the forest disturbance, a binary classification of intact/deforested areas, obtained from the probability of change;

    • the CFM (Computed Forest Mask) image which is an update, based on disturbance, of the FNF mask given as input, generated outside of BPS [AD6] [AD7] [AD8] [AD9].

The algorithms are envisaged to generate the product in INT phase with the optional possibility of having it also from TOM phase: in this case the FD product family will be empty but for the ADS ACM (see 4.3).

  • Level-2b (L2b): product composed by the binary classification of intact/deforested areas (disturbance) and the probability of change images along with the CFM (see 6.2). All on map and tile based, derived from merging of L2a in a given Global cycle, on the tile.

The Forest Disturbance product family is generated during routine phase by the BIOMASS Processors (i.e., L2a Processor for L2a products, L2b Processor for L2b products) running in the operational processing environment. The L2b FD processing is valid for INT phase only. L2 products are internal products generated only for the BIOMASS scientific team.

The L2b BIOMASS products are geocoded to a specific tile based geographic DGG [RD9], while the L2a products are geocoded in a latitude-longitude projection with the same origin and sampling of the DGG, but with an extension of the current L2a product ground coverage.

Note

Provided that FD algorithm proper validation will only be possible with BIOMASS in orbit, the strategy proposed to deal with FH/AGB dependency on FD is to initially input to FH/AGB a Forest/Non-Forest mask generated outside of BPS [AD6] [AD7] [AD8] [AD9]. After testing FD performance with BIOMASS in orbit, FD dependency can be switched on again, provided it has a satisfactory performance.