| dc.description.abstract |
Many organizations, both internationally and within the United States, have invested
in forest sequestration projects to offset their carbon emissions. However, changes
in albedo and surface temperature due to reforestation and afforestation projects
may have unintended regional and global climate consequences. The objective of this
study was to quantify the change of surface albedo and temperature across different
land covers over the eastern United States using Landsat 7 ETM+ satellite images.
A second objective was to evaluate the results in the context of potential net climate
effects of reforestation and afforestation and their implications on carbon offsets.
Most land covers were found to differ in their shortwave albedo and surface temperature.
Specifically, open land (cropland and grassland) had a higher shortwave albedo and
surface temperature compared to forests. Albedo and temperature also differed seasonally
and with latitude for the same land cover type, suggesting that other factors influence
local energy balance and climate. The shortwave albedo results are consistent with
previous studies, but this study is one of only a few that examined both albedo and
surface temperature for many different land cover types. Additional research is needed
to quantify all of the physical and environmental factors affecting local and regional
climate over different land covers, how these factors relate to each other, and how
they will change through time due with carbon offset projects. In this way the true
value of carbon mitigation tools can be predicted.
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