Water Resources Research Act Program

Details for Project ID GU_2025_WEN_1

Land Cover and Land Cover Change in NGLA

Institute: Guam
Year Established: 2025 Start Date: 2026-01-01 End Date: 2026-12-31
Total Federal Funds: $33,040 Total Non-Federal Funds: Not available

Principal Investigators: Yuming Wen

Project Summary: About 20 years ago, a research focusing on watershed land cover change and land cover change in the southern Guam was conducted (Wen et al. 2009a, 2009b, 2011). The results have been applied for watershed management, soil erosion issues and natural resources management. Since about 90% drinking water comes from the northern Guam lens aquifer (NGLA), it's important to figure out whether land cover and land cover change in the northern Guam, particularly in the NGLA affects water resources including water quality and quantity. Therefore, this research aims to derive land cover information from satellite imagery and other remotely sensed data from different dates, and then land cover change can be determined based on land cover information from different dates. The first phase of the project will focus on land cover classification from satellite imagery, historical aerial photos if available, and images acquired from drones if possible.