Innovators III RS4EBV

Global biodiversity is facing a crisis as evidenced by recent and dramatic global declines in species and habitats. Tracking the state of biodiversity urgently requires operational monitoring systems underpinned by robust indicators. While these indicators convey invaluable information to policy makers on the status and trends of biodiversity, their use is hampered due to patchy geographical coverage of input data, differing measuring methodologies and insufficient time series data to track trends.

These shortcomings have fuelled the development of Essential Biodiversity Variables (EBV) as an intermediate conceptual step between low-level primary observations and high- level policy-relevant indicators. The EBV conceptual framework has been conceived by a group of internationally renowned ecologists under the lead of GEO-BON. The EBV model includes 22 EBVs, organised into six broad classes, as elements of a global biodiversity monitoring system in the same way as the Essential Climate Variables (ECV) are embedded in global climate monitoring.

RS4EBV aims to explore, develop and test, through local-scale pilot studies, the potential of satellite remote sensing for selected EBVs such as Ecosystem Functional Diversity (FD), which is a measure of the components that influence how ecosystems operate and function. The project will develop and test EBV metrics on Functional Diversity at high temporal and spatial resolution, using as major input Sentinel 2 measures of chlorophyll content and vegetation phenology. The project will link the novel attributes of Sentinel 2 (the combination of high temporal, spatial and spectral resolutions) to the monitoring needs of FD EBV in local-scale pilot studies with some in-depth validation of the proposed approaches in different ecosystems such as natural grasslands (North Wyke, UK), Salt marshes (Schiermonnikoog Island, NL) and Temperate forests (Bavaria Forest, DE). The project will build a solid scientific foundation for future large-scale studies of Ecosystem Functional Diversity in national and regional biodiversity assessments.