Presented at World Bank Land and Tenure conference, March 27, 2015.

1. GLOBAL FOREST WATCH:
BRINGING BIG DATA ON FORESTS
TO CLIMATE POLICY
Dr. Nancy Harris, Research Manager, Forests Program

3. Photo: Ollivier Girard/CIFOR
3

4. GATHER
ANALYZE
SHARE
GFW leverages a convergence of technologies . . .
4

5. and a unique partnership…
Baker & McKinsey
Blue Raster
Bobolink Foundation
BP-REDD, Indonesia Gov’t
Cargill
CartoDB
Center for Global Development
CIAT, CGIAR
Climate and Land Use Alliance
Conservation International
Danish International Development
Agency
Dept. for International Development
UK
Digital Globe
Esri
Food & Agriculture Org, UN
FoodReg
Global Environment Facility
Global Forest Watch Canada
Global WItness
Google
Gordon & Betty Moore Foundation
Greenpeace
Imazon
IOI Loders Croklaan
IUCN
The Jane Goodall Institute
Ministry of Foreign Affairs , The
Netherlands
Mongabay
Muyissi
NASA Ames Research Center
NASA FIRMS
NASA JPL
Norway International Climate and Forests
Initiative
OSFAC
OSINFOR
Planet Labs
Rainforest Foundation UK
Reforestamos Mexico
RESOLVE
Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil
SarVision
ScanEx
Swedish Intl. Development
Cooperation Agency
The Tilia Fund
Transparent World
UNEP / WCMC
University of Maryland
University of Minnesota
Unilever
United States Agency for International
Development
Vizzuality
Winrock
Woods Hole Research Center
World Resources Institute
Yayasan Puter Indonesia
Zoological Society of London

6. DATA USERS
Space agencies
National
Regional
Local
Crowd
Governments
Business
Civil society
Communities
Educators
Make complex data
easy to understand,
decision-relevant,
and in near-real time
. . . to empower a variety of users
6

7. Go to Global Forest Watch

8. Combine data sets to tell a visual story

9. Do your own analysis

10. Or… explore our data by country

12. Add your story to the map

13. Download the data

14. What’s next?

15. CLIMATE CHANGE IS UPON US
Image: Wikimedia

16. Global Carbon Budget
(Billion metric tons per year)
Humans can
reduce
emissions
with clean
energy and
energy
efficiency
Humans can
manage lands
to reduce
sources and
enhance sinks

17. COMBATING DEFORESTATION
ESSENTIAL TO CLIMATE CHANGE
11% of CO2
from deforestation
and other land uses
Image: Aulia Erlangga, CIFOR

18. SECURING RIGHTS, COMBATING CLIMATE CHANGE:
A WRI & RRI REPORT

19. COMMUNITIES HOLD THE KEY TO
PROTECTING THE FORESTS

20. OUR FINDINGS

21. OUR FINDINGS: RIGHTS ARE A SOLUTION

22. MAPPING COMMUNITY FORESTS WITH
GLOBAL FOREST WATCH

37. GLOBAL
FOREST
WATCH
C L I M A T E
Track carbon emissions from forest change

38. USE CASES
User Use Case
Governments seeking REDD+ funding
GFW Climate used as a starting point for setting
national and sub-national reference levels and
establishing MRV systems for REDD+. On-the-fly data
analysis provides decision support in real time on
how to design REDD+ programs cost effectively.
GFW Climate used as a dynamic capacity building
tool where theoretical training material is
transformed into applied, geographically relevant
analysis
REDD+ donors (e.g. Norway, FCPF) GFW Climateused as an independent monitoring
tool for evaluating REDD+ performance against
information reported by countries.
REDD+ project developers GFW Climate used as a preliminary tool for REDD+
project design and estimation of ex ante project
benefits.
All REDD+ stakeholders (incl. NGOs) GFW Climate used as a planning and implementation
tool to facilitate more effective REDD+ interventions

39. How do we monitor forest carbon?
http://banr.nrel.colostate.edu/allometric-data-collection/
Method 1.
Destructive
Sampling
(Impractical!)

40. How do we monitor forest carbon?
Measure diameter
(and height) of
trees in a plot
Convert diameter
and height to
biomass with
allometric
equations
Repeat
measurements
for many plots
Estimate average
carbon stocks per
stratum
Method 2. Measure sample plots  extrapolate
NATIONAL FOREST INVENTORIES

41. How much carbon is in different
ecosystems?
0
20
40
60
80
100
120
140
160
Tropical rain Tropical moist Tropical dry Subtropical
humid
Subtropical dry Temperate Boreal
Carbonstocksinaboveground
biomass(tCha-1)
Land Cover Type / Climate Zone
Forest
Forest Plantations*
Perennial crops**
Grasslands***
Annual crops
* Includes tree species e.g. pine, eucalyptus, teak
** Includes e.g. rubber, coconut, oil palm, coffee, cacao, fruit orchards, agroforestry systems
***Grasslands store a large proportion of total biomass belowground in root systems, so carbon stock estimates shown
represent total live biomass (above- and belowground.)

42. How do we monitor forest carbon?
Measure Lorey’s
height in a lidar
footprint
Convert Lorey’s
height to biomass
with allometric
equations
Repeat
measurements
for many plots
Estimate
average stocks
per pixel
Method 3. Measure sample plots  extrapolate
REMOTE SENSING APPROACHES

43. Yu & Saatchi et al. In Review

44. NASA’s Global Ecosystem
Dynamics Investigation
(GEDI) Lidar
BIOMASS
ESA’s Earth Exploration Mission Radar
How do we monitor forest carbon?
Method 4. Systematic satellite observations (2020+)

45. Stocks vs. Fluxes
Forest carbon stocks Carbon emissions from deforestation

47. What do users need?

48. We need your input!!
• Key datasets
– Area of tree cover loss
– Carbon stocks
– Emissions from biomass loss
• Analytical Functionality
– Combine data sets to tell a visual story
– Do your own analysis
• Upload and analyze your own shapefile
• Adjust time period of baseline
• Select carbon pools to include
• Modify data sources
– Explore data by country or subnational unit
– Download the data
• Useful metrics

49. GLOBAL
FOREST
WATCH
C L I M A T E
BETA VERSION HOME
CARBON STOCKS GHG EMISSIONS
& REMOVALS
National boundaries
Subnational boundaries
Upload or draw a custom boundary

50. GLOBAL
FOREST
WATCH
C L I M A T E
BETA VERSION HOME MAP BLOG PUBLICATIONS DATA METHODS ABOUT GFW
National boundaries
Subnational boundaries
Upload or draw a custom boundary

51. GLOBAL
FOREST
WATCH
C L I M A T E
BETA VERSION HOME MAP BLOG PUBLICATIONS DATA METHODS ABOUT GFW
Baseline carbon emissions: xx Gt CO2e/year
Percent reduction from baseline: y%
Avoided Emissions since 2xxx: x Gt CO2e
Carbon emissions from tree cover loss
REFINE ANALYSIS +
National boundaries
Subnational boundaries
Upload or draw a custom boundary
Add Results to Analysis Dashboard
See Dashboard

52. GLOBAL
FOREST
WATCH
C L I M A T E
BETA VERSION HOME MAP BLOG PUBLICATIONS DATA METHODS ABOUT GFW
Baseline carbon emissions: xx Gt CO2e/year
Percent reduction from baseline: y%
Carbon emissions
REFINE ANALYSIS X
National boundaries
Subnational boundaries
Upload or draw a custom boundary
Carbon Pools Included
Forest area data
UMD/GLAD
Areas to exclude from analysis
Freehand
Polygon
Upload shapefile
Aboveground biomass
NASA JPL (Saatchi et al.)
Woods Hole (Baccini et al.)
Carnegie (Asner et al.)
Country reported
FAO
Belowground biomass
Dead wood
Litter
Soil organic carbon
Submit
Add Results to Analysis Dashboard
See Dashboard
Time Period for Baseline
Forest Definition
FAO
Reported to UNFCCC

54. Analysis Dashboard Save & Go Back
to Map
Clear
Dashboard
Export
Dashboard
Results
Review Scenario Settings
Monitored Reductions to DateCarbon Emissions
Forest Carbon Stocks
Gross Tree Cover Loss
Emerging Carbon Emission Hotspots
Donor InvestmentsEmissions per ton of annual crop yield
Emissions Forest Loss
Emissions from Primary Forest Loss Carbon Stocks Per Pool
Average Total

55. We need your input!!
• Key datasets
• Analytical Functionality
– Combine data sets to tell a visual story
– Do your own analysis
• Upload and analyze your own shapefile
• Adjust time period of baseline
• Select carbon pools to include
• Modify data sources
– Explore data by country or subnational unit
– Download the data
– Identify emerging hotspots within an AOI for deforestation and
emissions
• Useful metrics

56. www.globalforestwatch.org
@globalforests
nharris@wri.org
GLOBAL
FOREST
WATCH
C L I M A T E
Thank
you!