Assessing Spatiotemporal Change in Land Cover and Total Dissolved Solids Concentration Using Remote Sensing Data

Document Type

Conference Proceeding

Publication Date

6-7-2021

Publication Title

World Environmental and Water Resources Congress 2021

Publisher

American Society of Civil Engineers

First page number:

384

Last page number:

396

Abstract

In the recent past, Pakistan's economy has suffered due to a shortage of electric power. To shorten the production and demand gap, coal reserves in the Thar region of Pakistan are being utilized. During the process of mining, a huge quantity of saline water is being pumped from the mining site to a natural depression called Gorano Dam. This study examines the impact of saline water on land cover in the area. Two scenarios including pre-disposal conditions (February 2017) and existing conditions (February 2020) were compared. Sentinel-II images with a spatial resolution of 10 m were classified using the maximum likelihood supervised classification method. This study also determines the spatial and temporal variation of total dissolved solids (TDS) in the Gorano Dam. Water quality samples were collected to measure TDS. Landsat 8 OLI images were used to develop a linear regression equation between Band 5 reflectance and TDS measurements. Using the regression model, spatiotemporal maps of TDS were developed. The results revealed that the area covered by water in February 2020 was 1,233,100 m2. After the creation of the dam, the area covered by barren land has decreased from 4,592,100 to 4,134,900 m2(9.96% decrease), and the area covered by vegetation has decreased from 3,682,400 to 1,906,500 m2(48.23% decrease). The coefficient of determination (R2) for the multiple regression equation was 0.846. The study will help to understand the impacts of Gorano Dam on the land cover of the area and temporal change in TDS of the dam.

Keywords

Land Cover Change; Landsat 8 OLI; Linear Regression; Remote Sensing.; Sentinel-II; Total Dissolved Solids (TDS)

Disciplines

Environmental Engineering | Water Resource Management

Language

English

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