Environz

• Better systems for better outcomes
• RMA on the road
• Fiordland Marine Guardians release annual report
• Environmental Protection Authority is born
• Tui Mine – two years on
• Waste Minimisation Fund criteria released
• LUCAS 2009 – a space odyssey
• Greener future for NZ film
• We can’t manage what we don’t measure
• Electric vehicles catch the eye of the Kiwi motorist
• National Environmental Reporting Forum
• In brief & For your diary

LUCAS 2009 – a space odyssey

The Ministry for the Environment’s LUCAS team was runner-up in the annual Computerworld Excellence in the Use of ICT in Government Awards at Te Papa in late October. The awards are a national recognition of excellence in design and application in the IT world.

A bumper crop of 16 entries was received and judges then whittled these down to four finalists including the LUCAS team.

But what is LUCAS?

LUCAS is a key project within the Ministry for the Environment because it provides the objective, verifiable data for New Zealand's contribution to fighting climate change.

Under its international obligations, New Zealand is required to report on greenhouse gas emissions and removals that arise from Land Use, Land Use Change and Forestry (LULUCF).

To help achieve that, the Land Use and Carbon Analysis System, otherwise known as LUCAS, has been designed and implemented by the Ministry for the Environment to ensure New Zealand is meeting its international reporting requirements under the Kyoto Protocol.

Because it is purpose built, LUCAS takes a unique approach to analysing the various land uses in New Zealand that have undergone changes.

In essence, LUCAS has four main components:

• Its geospatial component works by tracking and quantifying the changes in New Zealand land use by mapping it over time. All mapping has involved the extensive use of satellite imagery, some aerial photography and other spatial data. Satellite data was first collected in 1990 then subsequently in 1996/97, 2001 and 2008.  Another national coverage will be acquired in 2012.
• The second component is its database, known as Gateway. This database is used to estimate the amount of carbon sequestered by trees and is calculated by referencing data captured from forest and soil plots.
• The third component is its calculation and reporting application that runs both the geospatial and Gateway data to produce a set of numbers that are entered into a common reporting format for tabling at the United Nations.
• The fourth component is managing the physical measurement of plot data, particularly within soil and forestry plots.

The methodology

Established in 2005, the team's first priority was to develop methodologies appropriate for New Zealand. System Architect Peter Stephens says this was no easy feat.

“To start from scratch is a difficult task. We had to consider a number of measures that have never been taken before in New Zealand. The carbon accounting system within LUCAS focuses on carbon inventory and modelling in natural forest, planted forest and in the soil. Its development involved introducing the use of an airborne light detection and scanning device (LiDAR) to inventory forests, and developing land-use mapping and land-use change detection.”

He says on top of developing the method to carry out the required measurements and establishing the database and reporting system, finding a way to measure forests and soils was also a tricky component.

“Forest covers about 29 per cent of New Zealand’s land area – native forests 23 per cent, and planted forests the remaining 6 per cent. They are a major component of the Land Use Change and Forestry sector,” Stephens says.

Ministry figures show that in 2004 the forestry cover offset about one-third of New Zealand's greenhouse gas emissions.

Stephens says for carbon stock calculations LUCAS collects data on the forestry component in three classes:

1. Natural forest – Natural, native or indigenous forest. This area has changed dramatically over the last century but has recently been relatively stable. Natural forest plots will be re-measured between 2009 and 2013. 
2. Post-1989 forests (“Kyoto forests”) – Forests planted after 31 December 1989, into areas where the land use was other than forest. It is estimated that about 566,000 hectares of new forest has been established since 1 January 1990 in New Zealand (about two per cent of the country’s land area).
3. Pre-1990 planted forests – Planted forests existing before 1 January 1990. The approach to measure the carbon pools in these pre-1990 forests is still being decided, as designing a sampling system for Kyoto forest was given priority. 

“The distinction is important because under the Kyoto Protocol, only forests planted after 31 December 1989 into non-forest lands are eligible to be counted as new carbon sinks. Only these can provide significant international carbon credits under the international trading rules that New Zealand is committed to,” Stephens says.

How LUCAS works – the technology

For the carbon inventory of planted forests, the LUCAS project is using a combination of traditional field plot measurements and state-of-the-art airborne scanning LiDAR (Light Detection And Ranging). LiDAR systems use laser light to very accurately measure distances and can provide detailed three dimensional measurements of the ground surface and vegetation.

This has been calibrated with field measurements and modelling to determine the total amount of biomass carbon in our forests. The method was developed when private property owners didn’t allow plot measurements on their land.

Stephens says the other component being measured is soils.

“A large proportion of the global carbon stock is stored in soil, the top layers of which play a part in the carbon cycle. Living micro-organisms, dead animals and plants, and minerals all contribute to soil carbon levels.

“It is generally accepted that the amount of carbon in the underlying soil remains constant in the short term if land use does not change. However, any change in land use may cause the soil carbon stock to increase or decrease gradually – especially if that land-use change involves a disturbance of the top soil, as in agriculture and forestry,” Stephens says.

Eventually, these results should allow New Zealand to claim global credits for our carbon sinks under the international trading rules to which New Zealand is committed. It does so by providing evidence that the country as a whole fixes more carbon dioxide than the total amount of greenhouse gas it produces.

LUCAS into the future

A positive spin-off from the main focus of the LUCAS programme is that the Ministry is offering satellite imagery free of charge to government agencies.

Chief Executive Paul Reynolds has written to 108 central government agencies, regional and local authorities, and some Crown entities offering the satellite images subject to conditions in an all-of-government purchase agreement negotiated by the LUCAS team. The satellite imagery is supplied under licence to LUCAS from Spot Imaging Services, Canberra.

LUCAS manager Steve Botica says the other information available from the LUCAS programme includes data on natural and planted forest and raw LiDAR data.

Some government ministries are already taking advantage of the access.

Principal Analyst with the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry Paul Lane says LUCAS provides a solid foundation for describing the smaller-scale planted forest estate through the spatial data it supplies. He says information like this will be needed in the future for infrastructure planning, wood processing and other industrial ventures.

“The fact LUCAS provides spatial information means that we know where the forests are, so we can work out which roads will be used to harvest the forests and which ports the logs and forestry products are likely to go to. It provides really important information for infrastructure planners, and for organisations such as the New Zealand Transport Agency, local authorities (district and regional councils), and other authorities, such as ports.”

Spatial Analyst with the Department of Conservation’s Ecosystem and Species Unit Richard Earl says the extra information provided by LUCAS will be useful for reporting on biodiversity outcomes in the Department’s Natural Heritage Management Systems Programme.

In collaboration with the Department of Conservation (DoC), Landcare Research has used the species information from the National Natural Forest plot network to statistically identify 24 different forest and shrub land types.

DoC is using the underlying environmental variables and disturbance layers (such as historic fires) at each plot location to model these 24 types. “We will then be able to map them across the country,” Earl says.

The next milestone for the LUCAS team is producing the figures for next year’s National Inventory Report, which includes 2008 data (the Inventory year is 15 months behind the current calendar year). The 2010 Inventory will include the Kyoto tables for the first time.

The LUCAS team will also have to defend New Zealand’s approach when the system is reviewed by an international expert review team in 2010.

Botica says at the end of the Kyoto reporting period when all the data sets are loaded, the LUCAS system will be able to determine changes in land use between 1990, 2008 and 2012 to help the Ministry determine its reporting obligations.

For more information on the LUCAS programme go to http://www.mfe.govt.nz/issues/climate/lucas/ or contact lucas@mfe.govt.nz

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