Modelling and monitoring of stand volume, above ground biomass and carbon stocks of oil palm (Elaeis guineensis) plantations using landsat thematic mapper in Malaysia / Nazlin Asari

Oil palm (Elaeis guineensis) plantations play important roles in the
economics and sources of income to Malaysia. Accurate and reliable
information on forecasts of resource availability and contribution of oil
palm plantations on global carbon cycle are needed for its management
efforts and planning. The need for effective inventories and monitoring
methods has prompted this research into supplementing the ground field
survey with the information from satellite remote sensing for developing
methods for oil palm plantation inventory. For monitoring purposes,
the effective procedures were developed using three dates of Landsat
Thematic Mapper (TM) imagery. Field-measured above ground biomass
(AGB), stand volume and carbon stocks values from 230.8 ha of oil
palm plantations were compared with individual Landsat TM bands and
nine vegetation indices. The potential models selected were obtained
using stepwise and backward elimination method where R2, adjusted R2,
Standard Error of Estimate (SEE), Root Mean Squared Error (RMSE)
and Cp were examined in model development and validation