Islands without Map

Integrating Geographic Information on Atoll Reef Islands and its Application to their Vulnerability Assessment and Adaptation to Global Warming

Abstract

 Although much attention has been paid to low-lying atoll reef islands as the first victims of a sea-level rise caused by global warming, they usually are not mapped (e.g., shoreline positions, elevation, and land-use/cover), thus a quantitative evaluation of the impact of global warming is not feasible. In this paper, recent advances in remote-sensing technology are described, including the current status of the mapping of shoreline positions, elevation, and land-use/cover of atoll reef islands. Then, the effectiveness of historical reconstruction based on the maps produced from archived past images, as well as archaeological human settlement data and socioeconomic data, is shown to examine the nature of the vulnerability of atoll reef islands to global warming. Overall, geographic information generated by remote sensing could be of great help for assessing and understanding the vulnerability of atoll reef islands.