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Calculate Absolute or Percentage Difference Between SpatRaster Objects

Source: R/diff_rast.R
differ.rast.Rd

Computes the difference between two SpatRaster objects, either as an absolute value or as a percentage of change relative to the first raster (r1). This function is commonly used to assess changes in spatial patterns, such as shifts in species richness or environmental variables over time or between scenarios.

Usage

differ.rast(r1, r2, perc = TRUE, filename = "")

Arguments

r1

A SpatRaster object representing the baseline or initial values. Can have one or multiple layers.

r2

A SpatRaster object representing the future or comparison values. Must have the same dimensions, resolution, CRS, and number of layers as r1.

perc

Logical (default is TRUE). If TRUE, the percentage of change relative to r1 is calculated: ((r2 - r1) / r1) * 100. If FALSE, the absolute difference (r2 - r1) is returned.

filename

Character string. Optional path and filename to save the resulting SpatRaster. Supported formats are those recognized by terra::writeRaster (e.g., ".tif", ".grd"). If provided, the SpatRaster will be saved to this file.

Value

A SpatRaster object containing the calculated differences.

  • If perc = TRUE, the layer name will be "Percentage_Difference".

  • If perc = FALSE, the layer name will be "Absolute_Difference".

The output SpatRaster will have the same dimensions, resolution, and CRS as the input rasters.

Details

This function performs a cell-wise subtraction (r2 - r1).

  • For percentage difference, the formula used is ((r2 - r1) / r1) * 100. Cells where r1 is NA or 0 will result in NA in the output SpatRaster for percentage calculations, to avoid division by zero or meaningless percentages.

  • It is crucial that r1 and r2 are aligned spatially (same extent, resolution, and Coordinate Reference System - CRS) and have the same number of layers, with corresponding layers representing the same variable or species.

Examples

library(terra)

# Load rasters
rich1 <- terra::rast(system.file("extdata", "rich_ref.tif",
package = "divraster"))
rich2 <- terra::rast(system.file("extdata", "rich_fut.tif",
package = "divraster"))

# Calculate absolute difference in richness
abs_diff_rast <- differ.rast(rich1, rich2, perc = FALSE)
abs_diff_rast
#> class       : SpatRaster 
#> dimensions  : 8, 8, 1  (nrow, ncol, nlyr)
#> resolution  : 0.125, 0.125  (x, y)
#> extent      : 0, 1, 0, 1  (xmin, xmax, ymin, ymax)
#> coord. ref. : lon/lat WGS 84 (EPSG:4326) 
#> source(s)   : memory
#> varname     : rich_fut 
#> name        : Absolute_Difference 
#> min value   :                  -5 
#> max value   :                   5 
plot(abs_diff_rast, main = "Absolute Difference in Richness")


# Calculate percentage difference in richness
perc_diff_rast <- differ.rast(rich1, rich2, perc = TRUE)
perc_diff_rast
#> class       : SpatRaster 
#> dimensions  : 8, 8, 1  (nrow, ncol, nlyr)
#> resolution  : 0.125, 0.125  (x, y)
#> extent      : 0, 1, 0, 1  (xmin, xmax, ymin, ymax)
#> coord. ref. : lon/lat WGS 84 (EPSG:4326) 
#> source(s)   : memory
#> varname     : rich_fut 
#> name        : Percentage_Difference 
#> min value   :             -71.42857 
#> max value   :             200.00000 
plot(perc_diff_rast, main = "Percentage Difference in Richness")