Mapping Land Cover Changes Using Landsat TM: A Case Study of Yamal Ecosystems, Arctic Russia

• Main Authors: Lemenkova, Polina, Forbes, Bruce, Kumpula, Timo
• Format: Conference Object
• Language: French
• Published: 2012
• Subjects: Sciences exactes et naturelles; Sciences de la terre et du cosmos; Cartographie; Géographie physique; Géographie rurale; Géographie humaine et aménagement du territoire; Aménagement du territoire; Télédétection; Systèmes d'information géographique; Photogéologie [géogr.phys. géomorph. pédologie; etc.]; Géodésie appliquée topographie [télédétection]; Méthodologie de la recherche scientifique; image processing; satellite image; image analysis; remote sensing; GIS; Landsat; cartography; mapping; Arctic; permafrost; Tundra; Yamal Peninsula; Siberia
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/2013/ULB-DIPOT:oai:dipot.ulb.ac.be:2013/364464; https://dipot.ulb.ac.be/dspace/bitstream/2013/364464/3/Lemenkova_etal_Kiev2012.pdf

This paper details changes in land cover types and vegetation distribution in tundra landscapes during the past two decades. The main method of the work is classification of the Landsat TM scenes for land cover change detection. The new approach of the current work is application of GIS and remote sensing tools for Bovanenkovo region, since there is no previous remote sensing and GIS-based studies performed in the same area focusing research problem of land cover changes. The research area is geographically located on the Bovanenkovo region, the north-western part of Yamal Peninsula, West Siberia, Russia. The Yamal Peninsula is the world’s largest high-latitude wetland system covering in total 900,000 km2 of peatlands, since lowland region creates ideal conditions for the development of wetlands, dense lake and river network (Kremenetski et al. 2003). The geomorphology of Yamal Peninsula is flat homogeneous land and low-lying plains with maximal elevations lower than 90 meters (Walker et al. 2009). Such environmental settings of Yamal facilitate seasonal flooding, active erosion processing, permafrost distribution and intensive local landslides formation.The dominating vegetation types on Yamal include different types of shrubs and willows, heath, grasses, moss, and lichens. The research methods consist of the application of the remote sensing and geoinformation tools for land cover studies. The technical implementation of the imagery processing, spatial analysis and GIS mapping was performed in ILWIS GIS. The research data include two Landsat TM scenes for the years 1988 and 2011. The Landsat data were selected due to their suitability for land cover mapping they enable recurrent remote sensing observations, interpretation and assessment of temporal changes in land cover types in the high north. The research methodology includes supervised classification of the Landsat scenes, GIS mapping highlighting changes in land cover types. And calculation of the areas of various land cover types in 1988 and in 2011. The ...