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ABSTRACT
This paper presents statistical evidence that Digital Elevation Model (DEM) derived from Google Earth is commendable and has a good correlation with ASTER (Advanced
Space-borne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer) and SRTM (Shuttle Radar Topography Mission) elevation data. The accuracy of DEM elevation points extracted
from Google Earth was compared against those of DEMs from ASTER and SRTM for flat, hilly and mountainous sections of a pre-selected rural watershed. The DEM data
from Google Earth and SRTM for flat and hilly sections are strongly correlated with the R2 of 0.791 and 0.891 respectively. Even stronger correlation is shown for the
mountainous section where the R2 values between Google Earths DEM and ASTERs and between Google Earths DEM and SRTMs DEMs are respectively 0.917 and 0.865.
INTRODUCTION
In Malaysia, topographic information is normally gathered from topographic maps available at the Department of Survey and Mapping Malaysia. These maps
need to be carefully scanned and digitized before the generation of their DEMs. Obviously for a wide area, these processes are tedious and time consuming. As
for these reasons, this paper presents an alternative method to extract elevation data using free online web tools. The resulting DEMS are then compared with
those from SRTM 90 data and ASTER data for quality assessment.
RESULTS
35
R2 = 0.791
R2 = 0.241
Elevation (meter)
40
Figure 3: Correlation of Google Earth data with ASTER30, ASTER10 and SRTM90
R2 = 0.140
30
25
ASTER10
ASTER30
Google Earth
SRTM 90
20
15
10
5
0
Elevation (meter)
200
180
160
140
120
100
80
60
40
20
0
11
Figure 4: Google Earth data correlated with ASTER 30, ASTER 10 and SRTM 90
R2 = 0.891
R2 = 0.102
R2 = 0.185
ASTER10
ASTER30
Google Earth
SRTM 90
11
21
31
Elevation points
41
51
Figure 5: Strong association between Google Earth elevation data with ASTER 30, ASTER 10 and SRTM 90 data in mountainous area
800
R2 = 0.917
R2 = 0.919
700
Elevation(meter)
R2 = 0.865
600
500
ASTER10
ASTER30
Google Earth
SRTM 90
400
300
200
100
21
31
Elevation points
41
51
0
1
11
CONCLUSION
For flat terrains, Google Earths elevation data produce DEMs that are close to those by
SRTM 90 which is approximately of 90-meter resolution. However, for more challenging
terrains of hilly to mountainous areas, the quality of DEMs from Google Earth becomes
better and almost similar to the quality generated by ASTER data. Free source of
elevation data is a tremendous help to researchers/students trying to minimize their
time collecting elevation data which is normally tedious, time consuming and costly. It
has been proven here that Google Earth is one possible source of that free elevation
data.
21
31
Elevation points
41
51
Authors
Noradila Rusli @ Ruslik
Phd Candidate
Faculty of Built Environment
Universiti Teknologi Malaysia
Email: radhiutm@gmail.com
Assoc. Prof. Dr M. Rafee Majid
Centre for Innovative Planning & Development
Faculty of Built Environment
Universiti Teknologi Malaysia