EXPLORING THE POTENTIAL OF FULL WAVEFORM AIRBORNE LIDAR FEATURES AND ITS FUSION WITH RGB IMAGE IN CLASSIFICATION OF A SPARSELY FORESTED AREA

Our study estimates the SEVIRI AOD profile across Europe with 3 km spatial and 15-minute temporal resolution. Using machine learning models trained on 2017–2019 SEVIRI data and validated with 2020 CALIOP data, we found that RF performs best at higher altitudes, with wind speed and direction playing a crucial role in improving accuracy. Validation with EARLINET data confirms strong agreement with XGB.