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Remote Sensing in Environmental Modelling

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A special issue of Remote Sensing (ISSN 2072-4292). This special issue belongs to the section "Environmental Remote Sensing".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 30 April 2024 | Viewed by 14596

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Dr. Monica Rivas Casado

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Guest Editor

School of Water, Energy and Environment, Cranfield University, College Road, Cranfield, Bedfordshire MK430AL, UK
Interests: surface water flooding; standardised monitoring approaches; systems engineering; disruptive technologies; climate change; extreme events
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Prof. Dr. Paul Leinster

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Guest Editor

School of Water, Energy and Environment, Cranfield University, College Road, Cranfield, Bedfordshire MK430AL, UK
Interests: environmental policy; environmental regulation; sustainability; governance; monitoring; natural capital; ecosystem services; risk assessment; emergency response; systems-based approaches; operationalizing research findings
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Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Environmental models are used for a wide range of applications, including natural resource management and flood emergency planning. Input data for such models increasingly rely on remote sensing technologies, methodologies and derived geomatic products. Remote sensing has become an integral part of accurate and detailed, and fit for purpose, environmental modelling. This Special Issue looks at compiling examples of timely applications of remote sensing for environmental modelling. We are interested in manuscripts around the creation, collection, storage, processing, interpretation, visualisation, assessment and dissemination of data and modelled outputs. We are particularly interested in country-specific case studies demonstrating the use and benefit of remote sensing for environmental modelling. The following topics will be of particular interest:

Forest ecology
Biodiversity and wildlife
Environmental informatics
Ecoinformatics
Biodiversity and environmental net gain assessments
Nature based intervention assessments
Natural resource management and planning
Climate change and extreme events
Atmospheric processes
Carbon sequestration
Sustainability and resilience
Hydrological and flood modelling
Country specific case studies

Dr. Monica Rivas Casado
Prof. Dr. Paul Leinster
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Remote Sensing is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2700 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

process modelling
environmental informatics
climate change
ecology
forest
sustainability
resilience
ecoinformatics

Published Papers (7 papers)

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Research

24 pages, 5600 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Assessing Tree Water Balance after Forest Thinning Treatments Using Thermal and Multispectral Imaging

by Charlie Schrader-Patton, Nancy E. Grulke, Paul D. Anderson, Jamieson Chaitman and Jeremy Webb

Remote Sens. 2024, 16(6), 1005; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs16061005 - 13 Mar 2024

Viewed by 627

Abstract

The health of coniferous forests in the western U.S. is under threat from mega-drought events, increasing vulnerability to insects, disease, and mortality. Forest densification resulting from fire exclusion increases these susceptibilities. Silvicultural treatments to reduce stand density and promote resilience to both fire and drought have been used to reduce these threats but there are few quantitative evaluations of treatment effectiveness. This proof-of-concept study focused on such an evaluation, using field and remote sensing metrics of mature ponderosa pine (Pinus ponderosa Doug. Laws) in central Oregon. Ground metrics included direct measures of transpiration (sapflow), branch and needle measures and chlorosis; drone imagery included thermal (TIR) and five-band spectra (R, G, B, Re, NIR). Thermal satellite imagery was derived from ECOSTRESS, a space-borne thermal sensor that is on-board the International Space Station (ISS). All metrics were compared over 2 days at a time of maximum seasonal drought stress (August). Tree water status in unthinned, light, and heavy thinning from below density reduction treatments was evaluated. Tree crowns in the heavy thin site had greater transpiration and were cooler than those in the unthinned site, while the light thin site was not significantly cooler than either unthinned or the heavy thin site. There was a poor correlation (Adj. R² 0.10–0.13) between remotely sensed stand temperature and stand-averaged transpiration, and tree level temperature and transpiration (Adj. R² 0.04–0.19). Morphological attributes such as greater needle chlorosis and reduced elongation growth supported transpirational indicators of tree drought stress. The multispectral indices CCI and NDRE, along with the NIR and B bands, show promise as proxies for crown temperature and transpiration, and may serve as a proof of concept for an approach to evaluate forest treatment effectiveness in reducing tree drought stress. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Remote Sensing in Environmental Modelling)

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18 pages, 13428 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Structural and Geomechanical Analysis of Natural Caves and Rock Shelters: Comparison between Manual and Remote Sensing Discontinuity Data Gathering

by Abdelmadjid Benrabah, Salvador Senent Domínguez, Fernando Carrera-Ramírez, David Álvarez-Alonso, María de Andrés-Herrero and Luis Jorda Bordehore

Remote Sens. 2024, 16(1), 72; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs16010072 - 23 Dec 2023

Viewed by 1287

Abstract

The stability of many shallow caves and rock shelters relies heavily on understanding rock discontinuities, such as stratification, faults, and joints. Analyzing these discontinuities and determining their orientations and dispersion are crucial for assessing the overall stability of the cave or shelter. Traditionally, this analysis has been conducted manually using a compass with a clinometer, but it has certain limitations, as only fractures located in accessible areas like the lower part of cave walls and entrances are visible and can be assessed. Over the past decade, remote sensing techniques like LiDAR and photogrammetry have gained popularity in characterizing rocky massifs. These techniques provide 3D point clouds and high-resolution images of the cave or shelter walls and ceilings. With these data, it becomes possible to perform a three-dimensional reconstruction of the cavity and obtain important parameters of the discontinuities, such as orientation, spacing, persistence, or roughness. This paper presents a comparison between the geomechanical data obtained using the traditional manual procedures (compass readings in accessible zones) and a photogrammetric technique called Structure from Motion (SfM). The study was conducted in two caves, namely, the Reguerillo Cave (Madrid) and the Cova dos Mouros (Lugo), along with two rock shelters named Abrigo de San Lázaro and Abrigo del Molino (Segovia). The results of the study demonstrate an excellent correlation between the geomechanical parameters obtained from both methods. Indeed, the combination of traditional manual techniques and photogrammetry (SfM) offers significant advantages in developing a more comprehensive and realistic discontinuity census. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Remote Sensing in Environmental Modelling)

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21 pages, 8929 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Towards a Digital Twin Prototype of Alpine Glaciers: Proposal for a Possible Theoretical Framework

by Vanina Fissore, Lorenza Bovio, Luigi Perotti, Piero Boccardo and Enrico Borgogno-Mondino

Remote Sens. 2023, 15(11), 2844; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs15112844 - 30 May 2023

Cited by 3 | Viewed by 1446

Abstract

The Destination Earth (DestinE) European initiative has recently brought into the scientific community the concept of the Digital Twin (DT) applied to Earth Sciences. Within 2030, a very high precision digital model of the Earth, continuously fed and powered by Earth Observation (EO) data, will provide as many digital replicas (DTs) as the different domains of the earth sciences are. Considering that a DT is driven by use cases, depending on the selected application, the provided information has to change. It follows that, to achieve a reliable representation of the selected use case, a reasonable and complete a priori definition of the needed elements that DT must contain is mandatory. In this work, we define a possible theoretical framework for a future DT of the Italian Alpine glaciers, trying to define and describe all those information (both EO and in situ data) and relationships that necessarily have to enter the process as building blocks of the DT itself. Two main aspects of glaciers were considered and investigated: (i) the “metric quantification” of their spatial dynamics (achieved through measures) and (ii) the “qualitative (semantic) description” of their health status as definable through observations from domain experts. After the first identification of the building blocks, the work proceeds focusing on existing EO data sources providing their essential elements, with specific focus on open access high-resolution (HR) and very-high-resolution (VHR) images. This last issue considered two scales of analysis: local (single glacier) and regional (Italian Alps). Some considerations were furtherly reported about the expected glaciers-related applications enabled by the availability of a DT at regional level. Applications involving both metric and semantic information were considered and grouped in three main clusters: Glaciers Evolution Modelling (GEM), 4D Multi Reality, and Virtual Reality. Limitations were additionally explored, mainly related to the technical characteristics of available EO VHR open data and some conclusions provided. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Remote Sensing in Environmental Modelling)

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22 pages, 4544 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Enhancing Solar Energy Forecast Using Multi-Column Convolutional Neural Network and Multipoint Time Series Approach

by Anil Kumar, Yashwant Kashyap and Panagiotis Kosmopoulos

Remote Sens. 2023, 15(1), 107; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs15010107 - 25 Dec 2022

Cited by 4 | Viewed by 2112

Abstract

The rapid expansion of solar industries presents unknown technological challenges. A dedicated and suitable energy forecast is an effective solution for the daily dispatching and production of the electricity grid. The traditional forecast technique uses weather and plant parameters as the model information. Nevertheless, these are insufficient to consider problematic weather variability and the various plant characteristics in the actual field. Considering the above facts and inspired by the excellent implementation of the multi-column convolutional neural network (MCNN) in image processing, we developed a novel approach for forecasting solar energy by transforming multipoint time series (MT) into images for the MCNN to examine. We first processed the data to convert the time series solar energy into image matrices. We observed that the MCNN showed a preeminent response under a ground-based high-resolution spatial–temporal image matrix with a 0.2826% and 0.5826% RMSE for 15 min-ahead forecast under clear (CR) and cloudy (CD) conditions, respectively. Our process was performed on the MATLAB deep learning platform and tested on CR and CD solar energy conditions. The excellent execution of the suggested technique was compared with state-of-the-art deep neural network solar forecasting techniques. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Remote Sensing in Environmental Modelling)

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26 pages, 11465 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Identification of Potential Natural Aquifer Recharge Sites in Islamabad, Pakistan, by Integrating GIS and RS Techniques

by Farooq Alam, Muhammad Azmat, Riaz Zarin, Shakil Ahmad, Abdur Raziq, Hsu-Wen Vincent Young, Kim-Anh Nguyen and Yuei-An Liou

Remote Sens. 2022, 14(23), 6051; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs14236051 - 29 Nov 2022

Cited by 7 | Viewed by 2428

Abstract

Islamabad is essentially the only well-planned city in Pakistan, but groundwater depletion has become a serious issue there because of the rapid increase in population, poor water management, and deforestation. The current water demand of the city is about 220 million gallons per day, with the Capital Development Authority (CDA) providing up to 70 million gallons per day. The need for water is mostly fulfilled through groundwater sources, such as water bores and commercial tube wells. Hence, identifying recharge sites for natural aquifers is a significant component of groundwater required to overcome the water crisis. Therefore, this study aims to identify potential sites for natural aquifer recharge by using analytical hierarchy process (AHP), weighted linear combination (WLC), and fuzzy logic methods. To achieve the stated objective, seven local influencing factors including soil, slope, water table, population density, land use land cover (LULC), drainage density, and elevation have been utilized in this study. AHP was utilized for the evaluation of the relative importance of the above-mentioned factors, while fuzzy logic was applied for the standardization of these factors. Finally, the AHP-WLC and fuzzy logic approaches were used to merge factor maps in order to identify suitable sites for natural aquifer recharge in Islamabad City. Two different suitability maps were constructed from both techniques, and on each of the resulting maps, the subregions were categorized into five classes: not suitable, less suitable, moderate, suitable, and most suitable. Based on the AHP-WLC results, 5% of the whole study area is deemed most suitable for natural aquifer recharge (NAR), whereas from the fuzzy logic results, 10% of the study area is marked as most suitable. In contrast, 37% and 32% of the whole study area were identified as suitable by the AHP-WLC and fuzzy logic methods, respectively. While both techniques can obtain satisfactory outcomes, the suitability map from fuzzy logic has produced more precise results. Hence, we propose to CDA-Islamabad here different sites for recharge wells based on the results of fuzzy logic. As recommended by this study, to date CDA has constructed twelve recharge wells. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Remote Sensing in Environmental Modelling)

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16 pages, 3206 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Geospatial Technology-Based Analysis of Air Quality in India during the COVID-19 Pandemic

by Ajay Kumar Taloor, Anil Kumar Singh, Pankaj Kumar, Amit Kumar, Jayant Nath Tripathi, Maya Kumari, Bahadur Singh Kotlia, Girish Ch Kothyari, Surya Prakash Tiwari and Brian Alan Johnson

Remote Sens. 2022, 14(18), 4650; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs14184650 - 17 Sep 2022

Cited by 1 | Viewed by 2305

Abstract

The study evaluates the impacts of India’s COVID-19 lockdown and unlocking periods on the country’s ambient air quality. India experienced three strictly enforced lockdowns followed by unlocking periods where economic and social restrictions were gradually lifted. We have examined the in situ and satellite data of NO₂ emissions for several Indian cities to assess the impacts of the lockdowns in India. Additionally, we analyzed NO₂ data acquired from the Sentinel-5P TROPOMI sensor over a few districts of the Punjab state, as well as the National Capital Region. The comparisons between the in situ and satellite NO₂ emissions were performed for the years 2019, 2020 and up to July 2021. Further analysis was conducted on the satellite data to map the NO₂ emissions over India during March to July for the years of 2019, 2020 and 2021. Based on the in situ and satellite observations, we observed that the NO₂ emissions significantly decreased by 45–55% in the first wave and 30% in the second wave, especially over the Northern Indian cities during the lockdown periods. The improved air quality over India is indicative of reduced pollution in the atmosphere due to the lockdown process, which slowed down the industrial and commercial activities, including the migration of humans from one place to another. Overall, the present study contributes to the understanding of the trends of the ambient air quality over large geographical areas using the Sentinel-5P satellite data and provides valuable information for regulatory bodies to design a better decision support system to improve air quality. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Remote Sensing in Environmental Modelling)

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31 pages, 23991 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Global Evaluation of SMAP/Sentinel-1 Soil Moisture Products

by Farzane Mohseni, S. Mohammad Mirmazloumi, Mehdi Mokhtarzade, Sadegh Jamali and Saeid Homayouni

Remote Sens. 2022, 14(18), 4624; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs14184624 - 16 Sep 2022

Cited by 7 | Viewed by 3027

Abstract

SMAP/Sentinel-1 soil moisture is the latest SMAP (Soil Moisture Active Passive) product derived from synergistic utilization of the radiometry observations of SMAP and radar backscattering data of Sentinel-1. This product is the first and only global soil moisture (SM) map at 1 km and 3 km spatial resolutions. In this paper, we evaluated the SMAP/Sentinel-1 SM product from different viewpoints to better understand its quality, advantages, and likely limitations. A comparative analysis of this product and in situ measurements, for the time period March 2015 to January 2022, from 35 dense and sparse SM networks and 561 stations distributed around the world was carried out. We examined the effects of land cover, vegetation fraction, water bodies, urban areas, soil characteristics, and seasonal climatic conditions on the performance of active–passive SMAP/Sentinel-1 in estimating the SM. We also compared the performance metrics of enhanced SMAP (9 km) and SMAP/Sentinel-1 products (3 km) to analyze the effects of the active–passive disaggregation algorithm on various features of the SMAP SM maps. Results showed satisfactory agreement between SMAP/Sentinel-1 and in situ SM measurements for most sites (r values between 0.19 and 0.95 and ub-RMSE between 0.03 and 0.17), especially for dense sites without representativeness errors. Thanks to the vegetation effect correction applied in the active–passive algorithm, the SMAP/Sentinel-1 product had the highest correlation with the reference data in grasslands and croplands. Results also showed that the accuracy of the SMAP/Sentinel-1 SM product in different networks is independent of the presence of water bodies, urban areas, and soil types. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Remote Sensing in Environmental Modelling)

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