DInSAR deformation time series for monitoring urban areas: The impact of the second generation SAR systems

We investigate the capability improvement of the DInSAR techniques to map deformation phenomena affecting urban areas, by performing a comparative analysis of the deformation time series retrieved by applying the full resolution Small BAseline Subset (SBAS) DInSAR technique to selected sequences of SAR data acquired by the ENVISAT, RADARSAT-1 and COSMO-SkyMed (CSK) SAR data. The presented study, focused on the city of Napoli (Italy), allows us to quantify the dramatic increase of the DInSAR coherent pixel density achieved by exploiting the high resolution X-Band CSK SAR images with respect to the RADARSAT-1 and ENVISAT products, respectively; this permits us to analyze nearly all the structures located within the investigated urbanized area and, in many cases, also portions of a same building. © 2012 IEEE

A user-oriented methodology for DInSAR time series analysis and interpretation: landslides and subsidence case studies

Recent advances in multi-temporal Differential Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) Interferometry (DInSAR) have greatly improved our capability to monitor geological processes. Ground motion studies using DInSAR require both the availability of good quality input data and rigorous approaches to exploit the retrieved Time Series (TS) at their full potential. In this work we present a methodology for DInSAR TS analysis, with particular focus on landslides and subsidence phenomena. The proposed methodology consists of three main steps: (1) pre-processing, i.e., assessment of a SAR Dataset Quality Index (SDQI) (2) post-processing, i.e., application of empirical/stochastic methods to improve the TS quality, and (3) trend analysis, i.e., comparative implementation of methodologies for automatic TS analysis. Tests were carried out on TS datasets retrieved from processing of SAR imagery acquired by different radar sensors (i.e., ERS-1/2 SAR, RADARSAT-1, ENVISAT ASAR, ALOS PALSAR, TerraSAR-X, COSMO-SkyMed) using advanced DInSAR techniques (i.e., SqueeSAR™, PSInSAR™, SPN and SBAS). The obtained values of SDQI are discussed against the technical parameters of each data stack (e.g., radar band, number of SAR scenes, temporal coverage, revisiting time), the retrieved coverage of the DInSAR results, and the constraints related to the characterization of the investigated geological processes. Empirical and stochastic approaches were used to demonstrate how the quality of the TS can be improved after the SAR processing, and examples are discussed to mitigate phase unwrapping errors, and remove regional trends, noise and anomalies. Performance assessment of recently developed methods of trend analysis (i.e., PS-Time, Deviation Index and velocity TS) was conducted on two selected study areas in Northern Italy affected by land subsidence and landslides. Results show that the automatic detection of motion trends enhances the interpretation of DInSAR data, since it provides an objective picture of the deformation behaviour recorded through TS and therefore contributes to the understanding of the on-going geological processes

Time Series Analysis of Surface Deformation Associated With Fluid Injection and Induced Seismicity in Timpson, Texas Using DInSAR Methods

In recent years, a rise in unconventional oil and gas production in North America has been linked to an increase in seismicity rate in these regions (Ellsworth, 2013). As fluid is pumped into deep formations, the state of stress within the subsurface changes, potentially reactivating pre-existing faults and/or causing subsidence or uplift of the surface. Therefore, hydraulic fracturing and/or fluid disposal injection can significantly increase the seismic hazard to communities and structures surrounding the injection sites (Barnhart et al., 2014). On 17th May 2012 an Mw4.8 earthquake occurred near Timpson, TX and has been linked with wastewater injection operations in the area (Shirzaei et al., 2016). This study aims to spatiotemporally relate, wastewater injection operations to seismicity near Timpson using differential interferometric synthetic aperture radar (DInSAR) analysis. Results are presented as a set of time series, produced using the Multidimensional Small Baseline Subset (MSBAS) InSAR technique, revealing two-dimensional surface deformation

Mexico City land subsidence in 2014-2015 with Sentinel-1 IW TOPS: results using the Intermittent SBAS (ISBAS) technique

Differential Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (DInSAR) can be considered as an efficient and cost effective technique for monitoring land subsidence due to its large spatial coverage and high accuracy provided. The recent commissioning of the first Sentinel-1 satellite offers improved support to operational surveys using DInSAR due to regular observations from a wide-area product. In this paper we show the results of an intermittent small-baseline subset (ISBAS) time-series analysis of 18 Interferometric Wide swath (IW) products of a 39,000 km2 area of Mexico acquired between 3 October 2014 and 7 May 2015 using the Terrain Observation with Progressive Scans in azimuth (TOPS) imaging mode. The ISBAS processing was based upon the analysis of 143 small-baseline differential interferograms. After the debursting, merging and deramping steps necessary to process Sentinel-1 IW roducts, the method followed a standard approach to the DInSAR analysis. The Sentinel-1 ISBAS results confirm the magnitude and extent of the deformation that was observed in Mexico City, Chalco, Ciudad Nezahualcóyotl and Iztapalapa by other C-band and L-band DInSAR studies during the 1990s and 2000s. Subsidence velocities from the Sentinel-1 analysis are, in places, in excess of -24 cm/year along the satellite line-of-sight, equivalent to over ~-40 cm/year vertical rates. This paper demonstrates the potential of Sentinel-1 IW TOPS imagery to support wide-area DInSAR surveys over what is a very large and diverse area in terms of land cover and topography

Coherency Matrix Decomposition-Based Polarimetric Persistent Scatterer Interferometry

© 2019 IEEE. Personal use of this material is permitted. Permission from IEEE must be obtained for all other uses, in any current or future media, including reprinting/republishing this material for advertising or promotional purposes,creating new collective works, for resale or redistribution to servers or lists, or reuse of any copyrighted component of this work in other works.The rationale of polarimetric optimization techniques is to enhance the phase quality of the interferograms by combining adequately the different polarization channels available to produce an improved one. Different approaches have been proposed for polarimetric persistent scatterer interferometry (PolPSI). They range from the simple and computationally efficient BEST, where, for each pixel, the polarimetric channel with the best response in terms of phase quality is selected, to those with high-computational burden like the equal scattering mechanism (ESM) and the suboptimum scattering mechanism (SOM). BEST is fast and simple, but it does not fully exploit the potentials of polarimetry. On the other side, ESM explores all the space of solutions and finds the optimal one but with a very high-computational burden. A new PolPSI algorithm, named coherency matrix decomposition-based PolPSI (CMD-PolPSI), is proposed to achieve a compromise between phase optimization and computational cost. Its core idea is utilizing the polarimetric synthetic aperture radar (PolSAR) coherency matrix decomposition to determine the optimal polarization channel for each pixel. Three different PolSAR image sets of both full- (Barcelona) and dual-polarization (Murcia and Mexico City) are used to evaluate the performance of CMD-PolPSI. The results show that CMD-PolPSI presents better optimization results than the BEST method by using either $D_{\mathrm{ A}}$ or temporal mean coherence as phase quality metrics. Compared with the ESM algorithm, CMD-PolPSI is 255 times faster but its performance is not optimal. The influence of the number of available polarization channels and pixel's resolutions on the CMD-PolPSI performance is also discussed.Peer ReviewedPostprint (author's final draft

Application of Differential and Polarimetric Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) Interferometry for Studying Natural Hazards

In the following work, I address the problem of coherence loss in standard Differential Interferometric SAR (DInSAR) processing, which can result in incomplete or poor quality deformation measurements in some areas. I incorporate polarimetric information with DInSAR in a technique called Polarimetric SAR Interferometry (PolInSAR) in order to acquire more accurate and detailed maps of surface deformation. In Chapter 2, I present a standard DInSAR study of the Ahar double earthquakes (Mw=6.4 and 6.2) which occurred in northwest Iran, August 11, 2012. The DInSAR coseismic deformation map was affected by decorrelation noise. Despite this, I employed an advanced inversion technique, in combination with a Coulomb stress analysis, to find the geometry and the slip distribution on the ruptured fault plane. The analysis shows that the two earthquakes most likely occurred on a single fault, not on conjugate fault planes. This further implies that the minor strike-slip faults play more significant role in accommodating convergence stress accumulation in the northwest part of Iran. Chapter 3 presents results from the application of PolInSAR coherence optimization on quad-pol RADARSAT-2 images. The optimized solution results in the identification of a larger number of reliable measurement points, which otherwise are not recognized by the standard DInSAR technique. I further assess the quality of the optimized interferometric phase, which demonstrates an increased phase quality with respect to those phases recovered by applying standard DInSAR alone. Chapter 4 discusses results from the application of PolInSAR coherence optimization from different geometries to the study of creep on the Hayward fault and landslide motions near Berkeley, CA. The results show that the deformation rates resolved by PolInSAR are in agreement with those of standard DInSAR. I also infer that there is potential motion on a secondary fault, northeast and parallel to the Hayward fault, which may be creeping with a lower velocity

Rapidly accelerating subsidence in the Greater Vancouver region from two decades of ERS-ENVISAT-RADARSAT-2 DInSAR measurements

Rapidly accelerating ground subsidence in the south-western part of British Columbia, the third largest metropolitan area in Canada with over 2.3 million of inhabitants, is estimated using the Multidimensional Small Baseline Subset (MSBAS) advanced Differential Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (DInSAR), an effective processing strategy for multi-mission, multi-temporal SAR data. The Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) data used in this study consists of seven independent data sets: one ascending and one descending ERS-1/2 and ENVISAT frames, together spanning July 1995–September 2010, and three RADARSAT-2 frames spanning February 2009–October 2012. During the July 1995–October 2012 period we observe fast ground subsidence with a maximum rate of about 2 cm/year in the Greater Vancouver region that includes the Fraser River Delta and the cities of Burnaby, Richmond, Surrey, New Westminster and Vancouver. The rapidly accelerating subsidence is observed beneath the Vancouver International Airport, SkyTrain terminal as well as several agricultural and industrial locales. These time series suggest that the subsidence rate at the studied regions does not decrease with time, as suggested in previous studies, but remains steady or increases. These results also demonstrate the importance of acquiring and appropriately estimating longer time series, as previous studies on the same Greater Vancouver area may have misinterpreted the long term ground deformation rate and direction and underestimated the potential hazard. The long term impact of this subsidence on urban infrastructure can be significant and needs to be investigated further.The work of PG was supported by Banting Postdoctoral Fellowship. The work of KFT was supported by an NSERC Discovery Grant.Peer reviewe

Parameters affecting interferometric coherence and implications for long-term operational monitoring of mining-induced surface deformation

Includes abstract.Includes bibliographical references.Surface deformation due to underground mining poses risks to health and safety as well as infrastructure and the environment. Consequently, the need for long-term operational monitoring systems exists. Traditional field-based measurements are point-based meaning that the full extent of deforming areas is poorly understood. Field-based techniques are also labour intensive if large areas are to be monitored on a regular basis. To overcome these limitations, this investigation considered traditional and advanced differential radar interferometry techniques for their ability to monitor large areas over time, remotely. An area known to be experiencing mining induced surface deformation was used as test case. The agricultural nature of the area implied that signal decorrelation effects were expected. Consequently, four sources of data, captured at three wavelengths by earth-orbiting satellites were obtained. This provided the opportunity to investigate different phase decorrelation effects on data from standard imaging platforms using real-world deformation phenomenon as test-case. The data were processed using standard dInSAR and polInSAR techniques. The deformation measurement results together with an analysis of parameters most detrimental to long-term monitoring were presented. The results revealed that, contrary to the hypothesis, polInSAR techniques did not provide an enhanced ability to monitor surface deformation compared to dInSAR techniques. Although significant improvements in coherence values were obtained, the spatial heterogeneity of phase measurements could not be improved. Consequently, polInSAR could not overcome ecorrelation associated with vegetation cover and evolving land surfaces. However, polarimetric information could be used to assess the scattering behaviour of the surface, thereby guiding the definition of optimal sensor configuration for long-term monitoring. Despite temporal and geometric decorrelation, the results presented demonstrated that mining-induced deformation could be measured and monitored using dInSAR techniques. Large areas could be monitored remotely and the areal extent of deforming areas could be assessed, effectively overcoming the limitations of field-based techniques. Consequently, guidelines for the optimal sensor configuration and image acquisition strategy for long-term operational monitoring of mining-induced surface deformation were provided

A general framework and related procedures for multiscale analyses of DInSAR data in subsiding urban areas

In the last decade Differential Synthetic Aperture Radar (DInSAR) data were successfully tested in a number of case studies for the detection, mapping and monitoring of ground displacements associated with natural or anthropogenic phenomena. More recently, several national and regional projects all around the world provided rich data archives whose confident use, however, should rely on multidisciplinary experts in order to avoid misleading interpretations. To this aim, the present work first introduces a general framework for the use of DInSAR data; then, focusing on the analysis of subsidence phenomena and the related consequences to the exposed facilities, a set of original procedures is proposed. By drawing a multiscale approach the study highlights the different goals to be pursued at different scales of analysis via high/very high resolution SAR sensors and presents the results with reference to the case study of the Campania region (southern Italy) where widespread ground displacements occurred and damages of different severity were recorded

A GeoNode-based platform for an effective exploitation of advanced DInSAR measurements

This work presents the development of an efficient tool for managing, visualizing, analysing, and integrating with other data sources, the deformation time-series obtained by applying the advanced differential interferometric synthetic aperture radar (DInSAR) techniques. To implement such a tool we extend the functionalities of GeoNode, which is a web-based platform providing an open source framework based on the Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) standards, that allows development of Geospatial Information Systems (GIS) and Spatial Data Infrastructures (SDI). In particular, our efforts have been dedicated to enable the GeoNode platform to effectively analyze and visualize the spatio/temporal characteristics of the DInSAR deformation time-series and their related products. Moreover, the implemented multi-thread based new functionalities allow us to efficiently upload and update large data volumes of the available DInSAR results into a dedicated geodatabase. The examples we present, based on Sentinel-1 DInSAR results relevant to Italy, demonstrate the effectiveness of the extended version of the GeoNode platform