Use of InSAR data for measuring land subsidence induced by groundwater withdrawal and climate change in Ardabil Plain, Iran
Abstract The Ardabil plain, with an approximate area of 1097.2 km2 in northwestern Iran, has experienced land subsidence due to intensive groundwater withdrawal and long seasons of drought in recent years. Different techniques have been used to investigate and evaluate subsidence in this region incl...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Nature Portfolio
2022-08-01
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| Series: | Scientific Reports |
| Online Access: | https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-022-17438-y |
| _version_ | 1811340515600236544 |
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| author | Zahra Ghorbani Ali Khosravi Yasser Maghsoudi Farid Fazel Mojtahedi Eslam Javadnia Ali Nazari |
| author_facet | Zahra Ghorbani Ali Khosravi Yasser Maghsoudi Farid Fazel Mojtahedi Eslam Javadnia Ali Nazari |
| author_sort | Zahra Ghorbani |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Abstract The Ardabil plain, with an approximate area of 1097.2 km2 in northwestern Iran, has experienced land subsidence due to intensive groundwater withdrawal and long seasons of drought in recent years. Different techniques have been used to investigate and evaluate subsidence in this region including: Global Positioning Systems (GPS), Levelling, and Geotechnical methods. These methods are typically expensive, time-consuming, and identify only a small fraction of the areas prone to subsidence. This study employs an Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (InSAR) technique to measure the long-term subsidence of the plain. An open-source SAR interferometry time series analysis package, LiCSBAS, that integrates with the automated Sentinel-1 InSAR processor (COMET-LiCSAR) is used to analyze Sentinel-1 satellite images from October 2014 to January 2021. Processing of Sentinel-1 images shows that the Ardabil plain has been facing rapid subsidence due to groundwater pumping and reduced rainfall, especially between May 2018 to January 2019. The maximum subsidence rate was 45 mm/yr, measured at the southeastern part of the plain. While providing significant advantages (less processing time and disk space) over other InSAR processing packages, implementation of the LiCSBAS processing package and its accuracy for land subsidence measurements at different scales needs further evaluation. This study provides a procedure for evaluating its efficiency and accuracy for land subsidence measurements by comparing its measurements with the results of the GMTSAR and geotechnical numerical modeling. The results of geotechnical numerical modeling showed land subsidence with an average annual rate of 38 mm between 2006 and 2020, which was close to measurements using the InSAR technique. Comparison of the subsidence measurements of the Ardabil plain using the LiCSBAS package with results obtained from other techniques shows that LiCSBAS is able to accurately detect land deformation at large scales (~ km). However, they may not be optimized for more local deformations such as infrastructure monitoring. |
| first_indexed | 2024-04-13T18:43:06Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-ef3750f4ed9446bea636346b009d1e54 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 2045-2322 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-04-13T18:43:06Z |
| publishDate | 2022-08-01 |
| publisher | Nature Portfolio |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Scientific Reports |
| spelling | doaj.art-ef3750f4ed9446bea636346b009d1e542022-12-22T02:34:40ZengNature PortfolioScientific Reports2045-23222022-08-0112112210.1038/s41598-022-17438-yUse of InSAR data for measuring land subsidence induced by groundwater withdrawal and climate change in Ardabil Plain, IranZahra Ghorbani0Ali Khosravi1Yasser Maghsoudi2Farid Fazel Mojtahedi3Eslam Javadnia4Ali Nazari5Faculty of Geodesy and Geomatics Engineering, K. N. Toosi University of TechnologyDepartment of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Auburn UniversityCOMET, School of Earth and Environment, University of LeedsDepartment of Infrastructure Engineering, University of MelbourneDepartment of Surveying Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, University of ZanjanDepartment of Civil Engineering, KU LeuvenAbstract The Ardabil plain, with an approximate area of 1097.2 km2 in northwestern Iran, has experienced land subsidence due to intensive groundwater withdrawal and long seasons of drought in recent years. Different techniques have been used to investigate and evaluate subsidence in this region including: Global Positioning Systems (GPS), Levelling, and Geotechnical methods. These methods are typically expensive, time-consuming, and identify only a small fraction of the areas prone to subsidence. This study employs an Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (InSAR) technique to measure the long-term subsidence of the plain. An open-source SAR interferometry time series analysis package, LiCSBAS, that integrates with the automated Sentinel-1 InSAR processor (COMET-LiCSAR) is used to analyze Sentinel-1 satellite images from October 2014 to January 2021. Processing of Sentinel-1 images shows that the Ardabil plain has been facing rapid subsidence due to groundwater pumping and reduced rainfall, especially between May 2018 to January 2019. The maximum subsidence rate was 45 mm/yr, measured at the southeastern part of the plain. While providing significant advantages (less processing time and disk space) over other InSAR processing packages, implementation of the LiCSBAS processing package and its accuracy for land subsidence measurements at different scales needs further evaluation. This study provides a procedure for evaluating its efficiency and accuracy for land subsidence measurements by comparing its measurements with the results of the GMTSAR and geotechnical numerical modeling. The results of geotechnical numerical modeling showed land subsidence with an average annual rate of 38 mm between 2006 and 2020, which was close to measurements using the InSAR technique. Comparison of the subsidence measurements of the Ardabil plain using the LiCSBAS package with results obtained from other techniques shows that LiCSBAS is able to accurately detect land deformation at large scales (~ km). However, they may not be optimized for more local deformations such as infrastructure monitoring.https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-022-17438-y |
| spellingShingle | Zahra Ghorbani Ali Khosravi Yasser Maghsoudi Farid Fazel Mojtahedi Eslam Javadnia Ali Nazari Use of InSAR data for measuring land subsidence induced by groundwater withdrawal and climate change in Ardabil Plain, Iran Scientific Reports |
| title | Use of InSAR data for measuring land subsidence induced by groundwater withdrawal and climate change in Ardabil Plain, Iran |
| title_full | Use of InSAR data for measuring land subsidence induced by groundwater withdrawal and climate change in Ardabil Plain, Iran |
| title_fullStr | Use of InSAR data for measuring land subsidence induced by groundwater withdrawal and climate change in Ardabil Plain, Iran |
| title_full_unstemmed | Use of InSAR data for measuring land subsidence induced by groundwater withdrawal and climate change in Ardabil Plain, Iran |
| title_short | Use of InSAR data for measuring land subsidence induced by groundwater withdrawal and climate change in Ardabil Plain, Iran |
| title_sort | use of insar data for measuring land subsidence induced by groundwater withdrawal and climate change in ardabil plain iran |
| url | https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-022-17438-y |
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