Carbon Sequestration

This project is a part of Theme 4 and is focused on identifying carbon sequestration tradeoffs embedded in land use decisions to support future land management. Carbon sequestration is the process of capturing and storing atmospheric carbon dioxide.

The objectives of this project are to use high-resolution satellite and aerial imagery and community data gathering to generate more detailed land classification datasets that can be used to determine trajectories of land over change and carbon fluxes in Hawaiʻi over the past two decades. Then use these datasets to generate interactive visualizations and next-generation decision support tools and applications to help decision-makers understand the multi-sector impact of current land use change. Lastly, to model the potential of future land use practices to support efforts at local, county and community levels.

Change Hawaiʻi researcher Dr. Joseph Percival has developed PyForestScan a Python library for analyzing and visualizing forest structure using airborne 3D point cloud data. It facilitates the extraction of essential forest metrics—such as canopy height, plant area index (PAI), canopy cover, plant area density (PAD), and foliage height diversity (FHD)—to help researchers and land managers better understand forest composition, health, and ecological processes. By offering a streamlined workflow for processing and interpreting point cloud data, PyForestScan is a powerful and user-friendly tool for those seeking detailed insights into forest ecosystems.

Learn more at: https://pyforestscan.sefa.ai/

Meet the Team

Climate Scientists

Data Scientists