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LAND COVER TRENDS: RATES, CAUSES, AND CONSEQUENCES OF LATE TWENTIETH CENTURY U.S LAND COVER CHANGE
Citation:
Loveland, T. R., T. Sohl, K. Sayler, A. Gallant, J. Dwyer, J. Vogelmann, G. Zylstra, T Wade, C Edmonds, D J. Chaloud, AND K B. Jones. LAND COVER TRENDS: RATES, CAUSES, AND CONSEQUENCES OF LATE TWENTIETH CENTURY U.S LAND COVER CHANGE. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Washington, DC, EPA/600/R-99/105 (NTIS PB2001-100348), 2000.
Impact/Purpose:
The primary objectives of this research are to:
- Provide information on the variability in water supply that can be expected under varying climatic conditions. Early efforts will be focused on assembling regional databases for at least two counties (Mecklenberg County and York County) within SEQL region that can be used for water supply generation and model development.
- Develop tools that will help improve our ability to evaluate, study, and model linkages between different types of environmental systems: hydrologic, geomorphic, ecological, and climatic.
- Explore the use of annual and seasonal measurements of large lake surface temperatures as a new ecological indicator of the overall thermal content of those lakes, and construct an estimator of seasonal large lake heat budgets.
Description:
Information on the rates, driving forces, and consequences of land use and land cover change is important in studies addressing issues ranging from the health of aquatic resources to climate change. This four-year research project between the U.S. Geological Survey and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has a goal to document the types, geographic distributions, and rates of land cover change on a region-by region basis over the past 30 years for the conterminous U.S., and to determine some of the key drivers and consequences of the changes. The objectives of the study are to: 1)Develop a comprehensive methodology for using sampling and change analysis techniques and Landsat MSS and TM data for measuring regional land cover change across the U.S. 2) Characterize the types, rates, and temporal variability of change for a 30-year period. 3) Document regional driving forces and consequences of change. 4) Prepare a national synthesis of land cover change.
The estimates of conterminous U.S. rates, driving forces, and consequences of land cover change will be developed for 84 ecoregions defined by Omernik of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. These will permit the analysis of the spatial dimension of land cover change, and will also contribute to the assessment of consequences of land cover change. Our goal is to identify greater than or equal to 1% change in general land cover within each ecoregion, at an 85% confidence level. Initially, we will test our ability to achieve this goal in five pilot regions: (1) Montana Valley and Foothill Prairies, (2) North Central Appalachians, (3) Norther Piedmont, (4) Southeastern Plains, and (5) Madrean Archipelago. Based on the results of the pilot test, we will refine and apply an appropriate methodology to the remaining conterminous U.S. ecoregions.