Satellite-based monitoring of forest cover change in indonesia using google earth engine from 2000 to 2016

Abstract

Abstract The Google Earth Engine (GEE) is a cloud computing system providing data analysis platform with various satellite based observation data and other earth observation datasets. Therefore, application of the GEE enable us to analyze terrestrial environemtal changes in an effective way. This study aims to test GEE capability to monitor forest cover change in Indonesia from 2000 to 2016 by performing raster and vector manipulations using Landsat-based forest cover datasets. Deforestation is one of the most important environmental problem in Indonesia, and monitoring of forest cover changes is urgent task for environmental protection. The found that GEE is very effective to analyze large amount of remote sensing data quickly, and estimated forest cover area in 2000 and its interannual variations in Indonesia. Factors affecting land cover in Indonesia will be elaborated in further detail in this paper.