A High-Resolution Global Lake Inventory with Classified Freshwater and Saline Types

Abstract:

Lakes are the largest surface water stock readily accessible to human need. Monitoring and understanding the distribution, change, and vulnerability of contemporary lakes remain as one of the top priorities in hydrological studies. Our recent project supported by the U.S. Geological Survey produced a high-resolution inventory of global lake extents (greater than 0.4 hectare) using circa 2000 Landsat TM and ETM+ imagery, which further enhanced human’s vision on the precise physical distribution of contemporary surface water stock worldwide. Continuous advancement in understanding regional-to-global surface water stress demands expanded knowledge on not only water discharge in streams and rivers but also stock in freshwater lakes. Yet to our best knowledge, we are currently lacking detailed, reliable inventory of lake water types on a global scale. Here we represent a progressing world lake database with differentiated freshwater and saline categories by integrating hydrological analysis, climate data, and spectral remote sensing. This effort is a natural extension of our global lake mapping project and a prerequisite of our overarching goal to assess global lake vulnerability. The completed lake data will also benefit a wide spectrum of scientific disciplines and water resources management agencies.