Another way to assess the urban damage and reconstruction of Japan is to observe night light data. By examining the images through a density slice in ENVI it is possible to not only see where light and power has been lost in Japan, but also the strength of the lights in the image can determine the extent of damage to urban areas with a high concentration of dense lighting.
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| The picture above shows lighting throughout Japan in late 2010, a few months before the earthquake, has been measured with low densities of lights in red, and the highest concentrations in yellow. |
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| This image shows night lights the day of the earthquake, dark areas that lost power are shown in red. |
The fact there was extensive damage is obvious, the night light data was used primarily to compare urban reconstruction over the following years. Below is a night life density slice of Japan in late 2012, over a year and a half after the tsunami.
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| It is without a doubt that the extent of urban lighting in our study area is no where near levels before the tsunami. |
Upon first glance there is a massive visual difference between the two night light images. By using change detection we could display which areas lost light density even after close to two years of reconstruction.
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| Areas that lost light density are shown in blue, while yellow shows no change, and red shows and increase in density. |
As expected Soma and the surrounding region's urban power and lighting is still not where it was prior to the tsunami.