How tall the forest canopy is (G-LiHT, map file)
What it measures. How tall the forest canopy is, mapping the maximum tree height and how much height varies across an area, at roughly 1-meter detail.
How it's made. Built from airborne laser scanning (lidar) flown by NASA's G-LiHT system over selected forest sites in North America, and packaged as a Google Earth overlay file (KML) with a low-resolution preview image.
How & where you'd use it. Helps scientists study forest structure, biodiversity, and climate-related change, with the map format making it easy to view canopy height over specific surveyed areas.
What's measured
Coverage & cadence
- Time span2011-06-30 → ongoing
- Measured byG-LiHT (Headwall, Riegl Airborne Lidar)
- Processing levelLevel 3
- Spatial extent-170, 10, -50, 73
- FormatsKML
- StatusACTIVE
What you can do with it
- Map vegetation, forests and biomass
- Monitor ecosystem productivity and carbon
- Support habitat and biodiversity studies
Official description
Goddard’s LiDAR, Hyperspectral, and Thermal Imager ([G-LiHT](https://gliht.gsfc.nasa.gov/)) mission utilizes a portable, airborne imaging system that aims to simultaneously map the composition, structure, and function of terrestrial ecosystems. G-LiHT primarily focuses on a broad diversity of forest communities and ecoregions in North America, mapping aerial swaths over the Conterminous United States (CONUS), Alaska, Puerto Rico, and Mexico. The purpose of G-LiHT’s Canopy Height Model Keyhole Markup Language (KML) data product (GLCHMK) is to provide LiDAR-derived maximum canopy height and canopy variability information to aid in the study and analysis of biodiversity and climate change. Scientists at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center began collecting data over locally-defined areas in 2011 and that the collection will continue to grow as aerial campaigns are flown and processed. GLCHMK data are processed as a Google Earth overlay KML file at a nominal 1 meter spatial resolution over locally-defined areas. A low resolution browse is also provided showing the canopy height with a color map applied in JPEG format.
Get the data
import earthaccess
earthaccess.login(strategy="netrc") # free Earthdata Login
results = earthaccess.search_data(
short_name="GLCHMK",
version="001",
bounding_box=(-122.5, 37.2, -121.8, 37.9), # your area (W,S,E,N)
temporal=("2024-01-01", "2024-12-31"), # your dates
)
files = earthaccess.open(results) # stream straight from LPCLOUDBrowsing CMR needs no login. Downloading or streaming bytes needs a free Earthdata Login + the earthaccess package.