High-Resolution Imagery of Earth at Night: New Sources, Opportunities and Challenges

Kyba, Christopher C. M.; Garz, Stefanie; Kuechly, Helga U.; Miguel, Alejandro Sánchez de; Zamorano, J.; Fischer, Jürgen; Hölker, Franz

doi:10.3390/rs70100001

Cited by 191 publications

(150 citation statements)

References 43 publications

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“…airports, prisons). A discussion of the potential of and challenges associated with using night lights data can be found in [25]. The reduction in artificial sky brightness caused by the church is even larger than the reduction in energy consumption, because of the reduction in spill light.…”

Section: Replacement Of the Luminairesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Reducing the environmental footprint of church lighting: matching façade shape and lowering luminance with the EcoSky LED

Kyba

Mohar

Pintar

et al. 2018

IJSL

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In rural areas of Europe, ornamental lighting, and particularly church lighting, is often among the most important sources of light emissions from communities. In current practice of façade lighting for churches, much of the produced light misses the target area, and façade luminance is often far larger than is necessary. This results in a dramatic waste of electrical energy and significant light pollution for the surrounding areas. This article discusses the concept of sustainability with regards to cultural heritage lighting, within the context of the façade lighting of a specific church. The lighting of the Church of the Three Kings in Logatec, Slovenia was replaced in 2014. The power of the installation was reduced 96% from 1.6 kW to 58 W, and spill light from the site was effectively eliminated. As a result, the church is no longer visible in nighttime satellite images of the area, indicating a reduction of waste light from the site of at least a factor of 30. This example demonstrates the dramatic extent to which more general application of lighting design principles could reduce energy consumption and light pollution in the rural European context.

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Section: Replacement Of the Luminairesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Reducing the environmental footprint of church lighting: matching façade shape and lowering luminance with the EcoSky LED

Kyba

Mohar

Pintar

et al. 2018

IJSL

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“…In their work, they provided a detailed analysis of city lights in the urban areas using the aerial NTL imagery dataset, which includes light from street lamps, light reflected from building facets, and so on. Kyba, C. in 2014 [56], reviewed the then-current NTL data sources, noting the availability of new NTL data sources with higher resolution, such as the International Satellite Station (ISS). The spatial resolution of the NTL data provided by ISS can reach 10 m, but many big cities are unavailable because of the flight angles.…”

Section: Application-oriented Communitiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Scientometric Visualization Analysis for Night-Time Light Remote Sensing Research from 1991 to 2016

Guan

et al. 2017

Remote Sensing

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Abstract:In this paper, we conducted a scientometric analysis based on the Night-Time Light (NTL) remote sensing related literature datasets retrieved from Science Citation Index Expanded and Social Science Citation Index in Web of Science core collection database. Using the methods of bibliometric and Social Network Analysis (SNA), we drew several conclusions: (1) NTL related studies have become a research hotspot, especially after 2011 when the second generation of NTL satellites, the Suomi National Polar-orbiting Partnership (S-NPP) Satellite with the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) sensor was on board. In the same period, the open-access policy of the long historical dataset of the first generation satellite Defense Meteorological Satellite Program's Operational Linescan System (DMSP/OLS) started. (2) Most related studies are conducted by authors from USA and China, and the USA takes the lead in the field. We identified the biggest research communities constructed by co-authorships and the related important authors and topics by SNA. (3) By the visualization and analysis of the topic evolution using the co-word and co-cited reference networks, we can clearly see that: the research topics change from hardware oriented studies to more real-world applications; and from the first generation of the satellite DMSP/OLS to the second generation of satellite S-NPP. Although the Day Night Band (DNB) of the S-NPP exhibits higher spatial and radiometric resolution and better calibration conditions than the first generation DMSP/OLS, the longer historical datasets in DMSP/OLS are still important in long-term and large-scale human activity analysis. (4) In line with the intuitive knowledge, the NTL remote sensing related studies display stronger connections (such as interpretive frame, context, and academic purpose) to the social sciences than the general remote sensing discipline. The citation trajectories are visualized based on the dual-maps, thus the research preferences for combining the environmental, ecological, economic, and political science disciplines are clearly exhibited. Overall, the picture of the NTL remote sensing research is presented from the scientist-level, topic-level, and discipline-level interactions. Based on these analyses, we also discuss the possible trends in the future work, such as combining NTL studies with social science research and social media data.

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“…Furthermore, since satellites generally observe at a fairly steep angle, they have reduced sensitivity to horizontal surfaces, such as illuminated signs and facades, car headlights, and light escaping from windows. Second, satellites observe in spectral bands that do not match the luminosity curve [4]. Third, the light rays satellites view have been partly attenuated by the atmosphere (particularly at shorter blue wavelengths), and atmospheric scattering results in a glow around cities, making adjacent unlit areas appear brighter than they really are.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Nighttime observations of Earth at night have recently improved to allow observation of artificial lights at the scale of individual lamps via aerial photography [1,2], at the street level via astronaut photographs [3], and at neighborhood scale via satellite [4]. The near global coverage of the satellite data make it possible to assess some aspects of lighting on wide spatial scales.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Changes in outdoor lighting in Germany from 2012-2016

Kyba

Kuester

Kuechly

2017

IJSL

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Changes in the total lit area and the radiance of stably lit area in the German federal states from 2012-2016 were investigated using satellite observations from the Day-Night Band of the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite. Most states increased in both lit area and radiance. The lit area of Bayern and Schleswig-Holstein grew most rapidly, but it is possible that their large increases are to some extent driven by a darker than usual observation in 2012. Thüringen was dramatically different from the other states, with an annual decrease in lit area, and in the radiance of stably lit areas. The rates of change measured from 2012-2015 and 2013-2016 are strongly correlated with each other (Pearson's ρ=0.67, p=0.01). In most states, least squares fits for the rate of change match the rate calculated as a ratio of 2016 to 2012. These results are therefore consistent with the hypothesis that the changes in observed radiance are due to lighting change, but this should be verified in the future when longer time series are available. Due to the (500-900 nm) spectral response of the satellite, transitions from high pressure sodium to LED street lighting that preserve total lumen output are be expected to be observed as a decrease in radiance. Since such decreases are not observed in most states, the observations of increasing light emissions in most states are not indicative of a national transition toward sustainable lighting. In addition to these results, this paper discusses the role of remotely sensed nighttime data within the context of sustainable lighting.

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High-Resolution Imagery of Earth at Night: New Sources, Opportunities and Challenges

Cited by 191 publications

References 43 publications

Reducing the environmental footprint of church lighting: matching façade shape and lowering luminance with the EcoSky LED

Reducing the environmental footprint of church lighting: matching façade shape and lowering luminance with the EcoSky LED

A Scientometric Visualization Analysis for Night-Time Light Remote Sensing Research from 1991 to 2016

Changes in outdoor lighting in Germany from 2012-2016

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