Comparison of classification accuracy between fully polarimetric and dual-polarization SAR images

Polarimetric Synthetic Aperture Radar (PolSAR) data is available at different frequencies and polarizations from various sensors like ALOS-PALSAR, Envisat ASAR, TerraSAR-X. This study compares the classification accuracies obtained with fully polarimetric and dual-polarization L-band ALOS-PALSAR data over Mumbai and Sundarban area. We have also compared dual polarized ALOS-PALSAR L-band TerraSAR-X X-band and Envisat C-band SAR data acquired over Mumbai area. IRS-P6 optical data over the same area has been used to compare the classification accuracy between optical and SAR data. The change in accuracy due to the phase information of SAR data is also assessed by comparing the classified results of intensity and complex images for all the possible polarization combinations such as (HH, HV), (HH, W) and (HV, VV) at L-band. The results show that the fully polarimetric mode gives maximum classification accuracy (above 95%). It is observed that among dual polarized data, complex (HH, VV) combination gives the maximum (above 92%) accuracy.