GIS and Remote Sensing

Biography

Biography: Obinna Anejionu

Abstract

Current global momentum urging the use of non-fossil-based energy as a viable means of curbing global climate change is prompting increasing interests in the use of bioenergy. However, increasing bioenergy generation activities are mounting pressure on land resources, leading to land use changes, which impact on global greenhouse gas emission and removal, as a result of its influence on ecosystem processes such as photosynthesis, respiration, decomposition and combustion. Land use land use change and forestry (LULCF) is included as one of the 6 key sectors of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) global GHG inventory. The IPCC guidelines outlined generic methods for the country-based accounting of GHG emissions and removals at three different tiers (levels of details). However, such national or regional accounting of the GHG emissions, where results are presented as national aggregates has limited application to related studies such as understanding the impacts of bioenergy industry-driven land use changes on GHG emission for specific areas or at sub-national and/or sub-regional levels. For such studies, a spatially disaggregated method for LULUCF accounting will be required. This study aims at using GIS and remotely-sensed techniques and data to establish the basis for the accounting of carbon stock, emissions and removals associated with LULUCF activities at varying spatial scales, based on IPCC-recommended methods. Spatially explicit land use areas will be used to develop nested multi-resolution techniques for the three different tiers based on remotely-sensed images of varying spatial resolutions, integrated with appropriate IPCC default values. This research is expected to establish robust platform for understanding how bioenergy activities may drive future global climate change.