NDVI-derived green-up date for the National Fire Danger Rating System

A new method has been developed to objectively determine green-up dates for the National Fire Danger Rating System (NFDRS). This method has applications for the current point-data NFDRS and for possible future calculations of fire danger at higher spatial resolutions.; The objectives of this thesis are to propose two features of a live fuel moisture model for NFDRS in the 21st century. The first feature is a method to determine in “real time” the green-up date at 1-km spatial and 1-week temporal resolutions using Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) from NOAA Advanced Very High Resolution Radar. The second feature is a process to determine historical green-up dates for historical analysis purposes.; The proposed method is the integration of area under a smoothed curve of NDVI from the curve minimum until the climatological green-up threshold is achieved. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)...