A 20 m spatial resolution peatland extent map of Alaska

Lara, Mark J.; Michaelides, Roger; Anderson, Duncan; Chen, Wenqu; Hall, Emma C.; Ludden, Caroline; Schore, Aiden I. G.; Mishra, Umakant; Scott, Sarah N.

doi:10.1038/s41597-025-04502-1

Title: A 20 m spatial resolution peatland extent map of Alaska

Journal Article · 06 February 2025 · Scientific Data

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41597-025-04502-1 · OSTI ID:2511331

^[1];

^[2]; Anderson, Duncan ^[1]; Chen, Wenqu ^[1]; Hall, Emma C. ^[1]; Ludden, Caroline ^[1]; Schore, Aiden I. G. ^[1]; Mishra, Umakant ^[3]; Scott, Sarah N. ^[3]

Univ. of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, IL (United States)
Washington Univ., St. Louis, MO (United States)
Sandia National Laboratories (SNL-CA), Livermore, CA (United States)

Peatlands are prevalent across northern regions, including bogs, fens, marshes, meadows, and select tundra wetlands that all vary in size (e.g., 0.01 s to 10 s km²) and shape (e.g., circular to elongated). However, our best remotely sensed products describing the regional-scale distribution of peatland extents are constrained to 1 km² pixels, often representing notable sub-pixel heterogeneity and local-scale uncertainties. Here we develop a new 20 m spatial resolution wall-to-wall ~1.5 million km² peatland map of Alaska, using peat cores, ground observations, and sub-meter resolution image interpretation. Ground-data were used to train machine learning classifiers to detect peatlands using a fusion of Sentinel-1 (Dual-polarized Synthetic Aperture Radar), Sentinel-2 (Multi-Spectral Imager), and derivatives from the Arctic Digital Elevation Model (ArcticDEM), that were spatially constrained by a peatland suitability model. Statewide peatland mapping (overall agreement:85%) identified peatlands to cover 4.6, 10.4, and 5.3% of polar, boreal, and maritime ecoregions, respectively, and 7.3% of the total terrestrial land area. This new dataset will improve the representation of peatland carbon, nutrient, and fire dynamics across Alaska.

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Research Organization:: Sandia National Laboratories (SNL-CA), Livermore, CA (United States)

Sponsoring Organization:: National Science Foundation (NSF); USDOE; USDOE National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA)

Grant/Contract Number:: NA0003525

OSTI ID:: 2511331

Report Number(s):: SAND--2025-01755J

Journal Information:: Scientific Data, Journal Name: Scientific Data Journal Issue: 1 Vol. 12; ISSN 2052-4463

Publisher:: Nature Publishing GroupCopyright Statement

Country of Publication:: United States

Language:: English

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