00:00Desde el espacio también es posible estudiar los bosques de la Tierra.
00:04Para hacerlo, la NASA utiliza Jedi, un instrumento láser instalado en la Estación Espacial Internacional
00:10que mide la altura y la estructura de los árboles en tres dimensiones.
00:14Con esos datos, los científicos pueden calcular cuánta biomasa y carbono almacenan los bosques
00:20y cómo cambian con el tiempo.
00:25Una de las cosas que me encanta mirar es Siberia, un lugar que nunca he estado en.
00:30Es un vasto, vasto bosque, covering so mucho de la Boreal Domain
00:35que tenemos casi no datos en, porque es muy difícil de llegar allí.
00:40Pero poder verlo en alta resolución y zoom en y ver lo que está pasando en esas partes de la
00:45mundo
00:45que no podríamos visitar por foot, es realmente cool y emocionante.
00:52Forests play a crucial role in balancing Earth's carbon budget,
00:56absorbing and storing roughly 30% of atmospheric carbon.
01:01However, vast regions, like Siberia's Boreal Forests
01:05or the Congo Basin's Tropical Forests,
01:07have been a mystery because of the obstacles we face in studying them up close.
01:14For, I mean, over 50 years now, we've been looking at forests from space.
01:19The longest record is from the Landsat program where we have these high-resolution images
01:25month after month showing us where there is forest, where we're losing it.
01:31But there's something we still don't fully understand,
01:35how much biomass we've truly lost.
01:39Biomass is the total mass of living things in a given area.
01:43If you were to cut down a tree and dry it,
01:47about half of the dry mass of that tree is pure carbon.
01:51So where we've seen historic losses in forest,
01:54we haven't known how much carbon was actually lost as part of that.
01:59But in the forestry domain, there is that hope, and it's actionable.
02:07Meet JEDI, mounted on the International Space Station,
02:11it's the first satellite LIDAR system specifically designed to measure forests in 3D.
02:17JEDI maps tree canopy height, forest structure, and surface elevation,
02:22giving us an unprecedented and incredibly detailed view of Earth's canopy structure.
02:27This allows us to measure biomass and the carbon stored within.
02:32But it has one major limitation.
02:36It had this huge data gap in the boreal
02:39because the International Space Station doesn't go over the poles.
02:42So essentially we have amazing data from JEDI over the tropics,
02:45over the temperate forests,
02:47but the vast majority of the boreal was just this huge data gap.
02:52That's where ICESat-2 comes in.
02:54We're so lucky right now with the forest LIDAR community
02:58that we have ICESat-2,
03:00which was not designed primarily for forests.
03:03The lasers are different,
03:04but it's still collecting really useful 3D forest measurements.
03:08ICESat-2 fills in these spatial data gaps
03:11by obtaining different measurements at different rates,
03:15giving us a more complete picture of global carbon storage.
03:19So these two LIDAR systems that NASA is currently operating,
03:23JEDI and ICESat-2,
03:24they're really quite complementary.
03:26They're in different orbits,
03:28and so their transect across the ground is a little bit different,
03:31so it captures different parts and different densities,
03:35as you will, within the mid-latitudes.
03:37By combining data from JEDI and ICESat-2,
03:41scientists can create a first-of-its-kind global biomass map.
03:46Now, we're able to track where carbon is being lost
03:50and where it's being regained as forests recover
03:53or new trees are introduced.
03:56So then, after we have JEDI and ICESat-2 on orbit,
04:00we can assign estimates of how much carbon is being lost
04:03or sunk back into those forests as we see them change over time.
04:07So we're uncovering all sorts of forest carbon stories
04:11that we've never had the data to do before.
04:15What you want to do is say,
04:16like, here's where most of the habitat is for biodiversity.
04:19Here's where most of the carbon is.
04:21These are the most,
04:22or the highest priority places for conservation.
04:26These are the best places for potential restoration, right?
04:29So we can use these satellite products
04:30to help guide decision-making,
04:32but then also provide this check
04:34to give us a sense of how well we're doing over time.
04:39Using this knowledge,
04:41NASA provides critical insights
04:43that help decision-makers take action
04:45in protecting and restoring forests,
04:48strengthening one of Earth's most biodiverse
04:51and carbon-rich ecosystems.
04:54With JEDI and ICESat-2,
04:56we're not just looking at forests.
04:58We're seeing a global picture
05:00of our planet's carbon cycles,
05:02impacts of forest management,
05:05changes in forest cover,
05:07and the future of our planet's carbon balance.
05:10We really can make a positive impact there,
05:13and we need these NASA missions to do that.
