1. VegDRI History, Current Status, and Related Activities
Jesslyn F. Brown, SAIC, contractor for USGS, Center for EROS
Brian Wardlow, National Drought Mitigation Center

2. Topics History and objectives of VegDRI Project timeline
Methodology and results
Evaluation and outreach
Related research activities

3. VegDRI Project Objective
To integrate remote sensing data into the USDM
Improve near real-time drought monitoring by integrating information from remote sensing sources with climate and biophysical data
Improve the spatial detail of the USDM by providing sub-county detail
Fill in the gaps especially in the West where there are no weather stations

4. VegDRI Timeline USGS USGS USDA-RMA NASA 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006
Proposal to USGS Geographic Prospectus
USGS
USGS
Proposal to USDA Risk Management Agency
USDA-RMA
Proposal to NASA Decisions CAN
NASA
Development of prototype VegDRI System
Build database using MODIS inputs
Transition to MODIS
Calculation of prototype spatial products
Test operational VegDRI System
Build operational VegDRI System
Build database using AVHRR inputs
Evaluation of VegDRI products
Link to NIDIS
Web mapping viewer
Integration into USDM
Quasi-operational product delivery
Test MODIS SWIR-based products
Put into national operation
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009

5. VegDRI Collaboration

6. Principal Drought Monitor Inputs
CPC Daily Soil Model
USGS Streamflow
Palmer Drought Index
30-day Precip.
USDA Soil Ratings
Satellite Veg Health

7. USDM Requirements for Remote Sensing Input Data
Consistent
Reliable
In anomalous vegetation signal, drought effects separated from non-drought
Seasonality taken into account
Familiar drought-like categorization
Timely delivery (to USDM authors by Tuesday)
Current information (latency not more than 48 hours—ideally within 24 hours)

8. 18+ Years of Satellite Vegetation Data for National Monitoring of Land Surface Condition
Noise reduction by
smoothing
AVHRR from 1989-present
MODIS from 2000-present
Drought Monitoring
Key measures of growing season performance
Higher Order
Vegetation Index
Products and Models
The value of the satellite database that has been consistently processed and is provided by the USGS EROS Data Center as a standard product is what we want to show here. We also calculate a number of other measures from the NDVI (Normalized Difference Vegetation Index—aka “Greenness”). Including Percent of Average Seasonal Greenness (next slide) that is a relative indicator of actual vegetation performance related to the mean performance for each 1–km pixel.
Rangeland
Performance

9. TIN
Time Integrated NDVI

10. Vegetation Drought Response Index
Higher Order Vegetation Index Products for Monitoring Phenology, Drought, and Range Performance
Start of Season
Percent Average Seasonal Greenness
Vegetation Drought Response Index

11. Percent of Average Seasonal Greenness (PASG)
X SG(89-05)= 21
Seasonal Greenness
Percent of Average
SG(06)= 64.7% 16 24 22
6/28/04
6/28/05
6/28/06

12. VegDRI Models: Current Drought Status
Model Input Layers
Start of Season Anomaly
PASG
VegDRI (Vegetation Drought Response Index)
Regression Tree
Modeling
Standardized Precipitation Index
Available Water Capacity
Land Cover
Ecoregions
Irrigated Ag.

13. Results for Seven-state Prototype Area
Regression tree model run on ~780 weather stations, 7 parameters
Produced rule-based models for 3 phases during the growing season
Dependent variable = PDSI
Phase
Start Day
End Day
SPI R2
Spring
113
168
52-week
0.757
Summer
169
238
0.846
Fall
239
280
44-week

14. Data Mining and Information Discovery Subsystem
Input Data
Data Mining and Information Discovery
Subsystem
Modeling and Dissemination
Subsystems
MODIS Vegetation Indices
CART analysis of input variables
Iterate with sample analyses
Derive variable coefficients and weights
Search archives
Data retrieval
Mosaic
Reprojection
Derive metrics
AVHRR NDVI
Data rescaling
Image
Extract samples
Produce Text File
Database
of Model
Variables
Model
Parameters
And Rules
Reproject
1992 National Land
Cover Database (NLCD)
Calc dominant LC
Subset
Image
Model Input
Data
Model
Results
Extract samples
Produce Text File
Reports
State Soil Geographic
(STATSGO) Database
Extract Attributes
Calculate Variables
Maps
Omernik EPA Level III Ecoregions
Rasterize
Reproject
Apply Model to Calculate Vegetation Drought Response Index
(VegDRI)
Subset
Image
Extract samples
Produce Text File
% of Land in Farms in Irrigation
(USDA)
Calculate variables
Polygon encoding
U.S.
Drought Monitor
DSS
Standardized Precipitation Index (bi-weekly)
Data retrieval
Subset
Compile database
Reproject
Segment seasons
Rescale data
Palmer Drought Severity Index
(bi-weekly)
Interpolate surface
Image
Extract samples
Produce Text File
Dynamic Inputs
New input datasets
Static Inputs
Model Formulation and Implementation;
Recurring Operations
Dependent variable
Processes to be automated or improved

15. Prototype VegDRI Products for Historical Years and 2002 Forward
1989
1993
1997
2002
2004

16. Schedule for expansion
Summer 2006
Spring 2007
Fall 2007
Spring 2008

17. 2006 VegDRI retrospective test

18. Information Delivery to USDM and Rangeland Stakeholders
USGS interactive map viewer
Quick maps
Interpretive text

19. USGS Interactive Web Map Viewer http://gisdata. usgs