Requirements for a global lidar system: spaceborne lidar with wall-to-wall coverage

Royal Society Open Science

Ciara McGrath¹  Christopher Lowe¹  Steven Hancock²  Iain Woodhouse²  Ian Davenport² 

[1] Applied Space Technology Laboratory (ApSTL), Department of Electronic and Electrical Engineering, University of Strathclyde, 204 George St, Glasgow G1 1XW, UK;School of Geosciences, University of Edinburgh, Crew Building, Edinburgh EH9 3FF, UK;

关键词: lidar;    satellite;    global;    continuous coverage;    vegetation mapping;   

DOI  :  10.1098/rsos.211166

来源: DOAJ

【 摘 要 】

Lidar is the optimum technology for measuring bare-Earth elevation beneath, and the structure of, vegetation. Consequently, airborne laser scanning (ALS) is widely employed for use in a range of applications. However, ALS is not available globally nor frequently updated due to its high cost per unit area. Spaceborne lidar can map globally but energy requirements limit existing spaceborne lidars to sparse sampling missions, unsuitable for many common ALS applications. This paper derives the equations to calculate the coverage a lidar satellite could achieve for a given set of characteristics (released open-source), then uses a cloud map to determine the number of satellites needed to achieve continuous, global coverage within a certain time-frame. Using the characteristics of existing in-orbit technology, a single lidar satellite could have a continuous swath width of 300 m when producing a 30 m resolution map. Consequently, 12 satellites would be needed to produce a continuous map every 5 years, increasing to 418 satellites for 5 m resolution. Building 12 of the currently in-orbit lidar systems is likely to be prohibitively expensive and so the potential of technological developments to lower the cost of a global lidar system (GLS) are discussed. Once these technologies achieve a sufficient readiness level, a GLS could be cost-effectively realized.

【 授权许可】

Unknown