Landsat 8 operational land imager-derived variables for environmental risk assessment in Taoyuan

Landsat Data Continuity Mission´s or Landsat 8 was launched into orbit on February 11, 2013. It opened up a new diverse range of data for natural environment research, disaster monitoring, and risk assessment using satellite-derived environmental and climatic variables. In this paper, it is our intention to present major potentials of Landsat 8 data to provide environmental variables and to propose a framework for environmental risk assessment. Taoyuan city of Taiwan that has been experiencing frequent natural disasters and environmental problems is chosen as a case study.