Extraction of forest biophysical parameters using polarimetric SAR

This thesis examines the potential of high resolution fully polarimetric C-Band SAR data for forest species discrimination and forest biophysical parameter modeling. The SAR parameters that are most useful for each task are identified and the achievable model performance is determined. Factors that influence the quality of the results such as radar incident angle and forest stand species composition are also evaluated.;Polarimetric C-band SAR measurements can be used to effectively discriminate forest species into broad classes but more specific classification is not as accurate. Furthermore, it was found that radar incident angle has a significant impact on the modeling results. The extent of the impact varies depending on the nature of the SAR parameter. Species stratification is also an essential component of model development. The strongest relationships are achieved for forest basal area and volume whereas age and height produced the weakest models.