Improving multi-technique monitoring using Sentinel-1 and Cosmo-SkyMed data and upgrading groundwater model capabilities

P Ezquerro; R Tomás; M Béjar-Pizarro; J A Fernández-Merodo; C Guardiola-Albert; A Staller; J A Sánchez-Sobrino; G Herrera

doi:10.1016/j.scitotenv.2019.134757

Improving multi-technique monitoring using Sentinel-1 and Cosmo-SkyMed data and upgrading groundwater model capabilities

Sci Total Environ. 2020 Feb 10:703:134757. doi: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2019.134757. Epub 2019 Nov 2.

Authors

P Ezquerro¹, R Tomás², M Béjar-Pizarro³, J A Fernández-Merodo⁴, C Guardiola-Albert⁵, A Staller⁶, J A Sánchez-Sobrino⁷, G Herrera⁸

Affiliations

¹ Geohazards InSAR Laboratory and Modeling Group (InSARlab), Geoscience Research Department, Geological Survey of Spain (IGME), Alenza 1, 28003 Madrid, Spain; Spanish Working Group on Ground Subsidence (SUBTER), UNESCO, 03690 Alicante, Spain; Universidad Politécnica de Madrid. ETSI Caminos, Canales y Puertos C/Profesor Aranguren s/n, 28040 Madrid, Spain. Electronic address: p.ezquerro@igme.es.
² Geohazards InSAR Laboratory and Modeling Group (InSARlab), Geoscience Research Department, Geological Survey of Spain (IGME), Alenza 1, 28003 Madrid, Spain; Spanish Working Group on Ground Subsidence (SUBTER), UNESCO, 03690 Alicante, Spain; Research Partnership Unit IGME-UA on Radar Interferometry Applied to Ground Deformation (UNIRAD), University of Alicante, P.O. Box 99, 03080 Alicante, Spain; Departamento de Ingeniería Civil, Escuela Politécnica Superior, Universidad de Alicante, P.O. Box 99, 03080 Alicante, Spain. Electronic address: roberto.tomas@ua.es.
³ Geohazards InSAR Laboratory and Modeling Group (InSARlab), Geoscience Research Department, Geological Survey of Spain (IGME), Alenza 1, 28003 Madrid, Spain; Spanish Working Group on Ground Subsidence (SUBTER), UNESCO, 03690 Alicante, Spain; Research Partnership Unit IGME-UA on Radar Interferometry Applied to Ground Deformation (UNIRAD), University of Alicante, P.O. Box 99, 03080 Alicante, Spain. Electronic address: m.bejar@igme.es.
⁴ Geohazards InSAR Laboratory and Modeling Group (InSARlab), Geoscience Research Department, Geological Survey of Spain (IGME), Alenza 1, 28003 Madrid, Spain; Spanish Working Group on Ground Subsidence (SUBTER), UNESCO, 03690 Alicante, Spain; Research Partnership Unit IGME-UA on Radar Interferometry Applied to Ground Deformation (UNIRAD), University of Alicante, P.O. Box 99, 03080 Alicante, Spain. Electronic address: jose.fernandez@igme.es.
⁵ Geohazards InSAR Laboratory and Modeling Group (InSARlab), Geoscience Research Department, Geological Survey of Spain (IGME), Alenza 1, 28003 Madrid, Spain; Spanish Working Group on Ground Subsidence (SUBTER), UNESCO, 03690 Alicante, Spain; Environmental Geology and Geomathematics, Geoscience Research Department, Geological Survey of Spain (IGME), Alenza 1, 28003 Madrid, Spain. Electronic address: c.guardiola@igme.es.
⁶ Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, Departamento de Ingeniería Topográfica y Cartografía, ETSI Topografía, Geodesia y Cartografía. Campus Sur, 28031 Madrid, Spain. Electronic address: a.staller@upm.es.
⁷ Instituto Geográfico Nacional (IGN), Geodesy Department, Spain.
⁸ Geohazards InSAR Laboratory and Modeling Group (InSARlab), Geoscience Research Department, Geological Survey of Spain (IGME), Alenza 1, 28003 Madrid, Spain; Spanish Working Group on Ground Subsidence (SUBTER), UNESCO, 03690 Alicante, Spain; Research Partnership Unit IGME-UA on Radar Interferometry Applied to Ground Deformation (UNIRAD), University of Alicante, P.O. Box 99, 03080 Alicante, Spain; Earth Observation and Geohazards Expert Group (EOEG), EuroGeoSurveys, The Geological Surveys of Europe, 36-38, Rue Joseph II, 1000 Brussels, Belgium. Electronic address: g.herrera@igme.es.

PMID: 31759706
DOI: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2019.134757

Abstract

Aquifer-systems have become a strategic source of fresh water in the present climatic conditions, especially under stress in arid regions like the Iberian Mediterranean Arc. Understanding the behavior of groundwater reservoirs is crucial to their well-management and mitigation of adverse consequences of overexploitation. In this work, we use space geodetic measurements from satellite interferometric synthetic aperture radar (InSAR) and Global Positioning System (GPS) data, covering the period 2011-2017, to predict and validate the ground surface displacement over the fastest subsiding basin due to groundwater withdrawal in Europe (>10 cm/year). The 2D decomposition of InSAR displacements from Cosmo-SkyMed and Sentinel-1 satellites allows us to detect horizontal deformation towards the basin center, with a maximum displacement of 1.5 cm/year. InSAR results were introduced in a newly developed methodology for aquifer system management to estimate unknown pumping rates for the 2012-2017 period. This study illustrates how the combination of InSAR data, groundwater flow and deformation models can be used to improve the aquifer-systems sustainable management.

Keywords: Aquifer management; Groundwater extraction; InSAR; Subsidence.