Brazil’s National Institute for Space Research (INPE) developed the TerraBrasilis web portal as the main link between the land cover data generated by its projects and a wide range of users. In this talk, we will discuss TerraBrasilis' development, updates, and improvements. We built the portal's front-end and back-end using free and open-source software.
INPE’s program named BiomasBR is responsible for long term projects that generate the official data about the Brazilian biomes. These projects process Earth observation satellite images with the goal of generating accurate and timely data to support the country in monitoring and controlling deforestation, forest degradation, forest fire, and other environmental impacts on the Brazilian Amazon forest and other biomes. In this talk, we address specifically the projects PRODES and DETER. The Real Time Deforestation Detection System (DETER) uses Earth observation satellite imagery to map and report changes in forest cover across the Amazon and the Cerrado biome. As a result, DETER produces, every day, sets of polygons, referred to as alerts, that delineate areas where deforestation or degradation (such as mining, forest fire scars, or logging) can be perceived. Each DETER alert includes the image date that generated it, the type of change, and other attributes. DETER uses images from sensors with high temporal resolution and large swath width, with the appropriate spectral bands to detect vegetation cover change. Currently, DETER uses mainly data from the Wild Field Imager (WFI) on board the Amazonia-1 and the China-Brazil Earth Resource Satellite (CBERS-4A). Command-and-control organizations use the data produced by DETER to plan and qualify field actions.
The Legal Amazon Deforestation Satellite Monitoring Project (PRODES) maps, annually, the suppression of native vegetation in Brazil. Initially, the project restricted its scope to the Legal Amazon region, conducting an annual inventory of forest loss dating back to 1988. In 2001, the project expanded its scope to include the monitoring of Cerrado biome. PRODES uses medium resolution imagery with the appropriate spectral bands to detect vegetation cover change. It uses images from the Operational Imager (OLI) sensor on board the Landsat-8 satellite, the Multispectral Camera (MUX) from CBERS-4 and CBERS-4A, and the Multispectral Instrument (MSI) from Sentinel-2. PRODES data has supported long-term public policies to contain native vegetation removal in the Amazon and the Cerrado. Currently, the project has expanded to encompass all Brazilian biomes. PRODES data support public policies, greenhouse gas emission estimates, and can help release international resources associated with conservation, climate, and biodiversity agendas.
PRODES and DETER generate a large volume of geospatial data useful to a several organizations. Given the strategic importance of these projects, and INPE’s commitment to geospatial open source and open data, the TerraBrasilis portal is the one-stop point to access PRODES and DETER data. The portal is used by the Brazilian government, academic and private sectors, non-governmental organisations, and the general public interested in environmental issues. As such, TerraBrasilis is a way to ensure INPE’s transparency regarding the environmental data it generates. It allows anyone to explore land cover data without requiring further knowledge.
The main functional requirements and characteristics that guide the development of TerraBrasilis are: multiplicity of users, with different technological backgrounds and different interests; data might be subject to temporal embargo before being public; temporal embargo might be overcome by authorized users; data is related to the same process, but has a distinct production timetable and distinct time granularity; data has to be presented as a web map with the conventional operations of zooming, pan, layer selection, etc.; data summaries should be available with common visualization tools such as graphs, charts, and tables; users need to make comparisons over time and different spatial units of interest, such as municipalities, states, indigenous lands, or conservation units; data can be downloaded in open formats; data can be accessed through open geospatial services.
Considering these requirements TerraBrasilis is designed as a set of multiple independent panels, to expose different views of its geospatial database. A series of scripts connect to the production database and prepare the data for publishing in TerraBrasilis. The publishing database contains over 2 PB of raster and vector data, and this volume increases daily. It contains data for Brazil's entire territory. Some datasets date back to 1988.
PRODES and DETER data are available in distinct web mapping panels that allow the visualization of multiple layers, spatial and temporal filtering, as well as the download of data in open formats such as GeoTIFF and Shapefile. They are also available in interactive dashboards where users can make comparisons over time and different spatial units of interest, such as municipalities, states, or conservation units.
TerraBrasilis uses a service-oriented paradigm that follows interoperable international spatial data standards and the specifications of the Brazilian National Spatial Data Infrastructure (INDE). TerraLib offers Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC)-compliant services such as Web Map Service (WMS), Web Feature Service (WFS), Web Service Coverage (WCS) and Catalog Service for the Web (CSW).
TerraBrasilis publishes all of the data generated in DETER and PRODES, and it is constantly evolving. Recently, the portal has developed and integrated some panels that integrate data from PRODES and DETER, along with other data sources such as INPE's vegetation fire monitoring project in Brazil. The Situation Room panel, for example, allows the observation of critical areas of deforestation and vegetation fire, through a series of indicators based on data from DETER and other environmental indicators. In this talk, we will provide a general overview of the portal, the technical aspects of its development, and the data presented in TerraBrasilis.