Sar Interferometry For Estimating Above-Ground Biomass Of Savanna Woodlands In Belize

Tropical savannas cover 20% of the Earth´s land surface and are important ecosystems in the global Carbon cycle due to their high productivity. This paper evaluates the capability of different shortwave synthetic aperture radar interferometry (InSAR) data for estimating above-ground biomass of the woody vegetation in heterogeneous tropical savanna woodland in Belize, Central America. Single-pass InSAR data used are X-band (Intermap) and C-band (AIRSAR and SRTM). Results show that retrieved canopy heights from both X- and C-band InSAR are indicative of general patterns of tree height, but the details remain inaccurate due to the heterogeneity of the canopy. Scattering phase centers for C-band are generally higher than for X-band over sparse woodlands, whereas dense tropical forest areas yield higher X-band scattering phase centers.