Evaluation of Eco-Management of Tropical Peatlands

Tropical peatlands are highly important ecosystems for storage and cycling of carbon and water and for high biomass production and biodiversity. These processes are highly dynamic due to climate change and human activity, which can cause them to become highly vulnerable and irreversible. An “integrated monitoring, reporting, and verifying” (iMRV) system for tropical peatland has become an urgent issue for management, evaluation, and monitoring of peatland dynamics. Because the tropical peatland ecosystem is dynamic, the iMRV system must address the four elements of (1) water and carbon, (2) biomass production and biodiversity, (3) deforestation and forest degradation, and (4) climate change and human impact. The innovative new iMRV system must deliver (1) real-time and high frequency, (2) high resolution (less than 1 × 1 m), (3) high-number and wide-range spectral bands such as hypersensors and PALSAR (phased array type L-band synthetic aperture radar), (4) 3-dimensional analysis, and (5) cost performance. Certain sensing/monitoring systems are available depending on the altitude from targeting fields: ground truth (monitoring), drone/unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV), and satellites. Finally, this work proposes the “international Equator observation system (iEOS)” composed of several sensing systems. However, in the future, the minimum unit should consist of hypersensors, PALSAR, 3D photogrammetry, and GHG sensors. iEOS is necessary because the Equator and the tropics are key features of Earth (planetary) boundary conservation, which is impacted by the most dynamic ecosystems and few sensing scenes unaffected by heavy clouds.