Creating near real-time alerts of illegal gold mining in the Peruvian Amazon using Synthetic Aperture Radar
Peru’s Southeastern Amazon deforestation trends can be attributed to alluvial gold mining. Illegal mining occurring in forestry concessions, national parks, and the territories of Indigenous People Organizations is of particular concern. We present a methodology to create near real-time alerts of de...
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| Format: | Article |
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IOP Publishing
2024-01-01
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| Series: | Environmental Research Communications |
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| Online Access: | https://doi.org/10.1088/2515-7620/ad937e |
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| author | Milagros Becerra Lucio Villa Andréa Puzzi Nicolau Kelsey E Herndon Sidney Novoa Vanesa Martín-Arias Karen Dyson Kaitlin Walker Karis Tenneson David Saah |
| author_facet | Milagros Becerra Lucio Villa Andréa Puzzi Nicolau Kelsey E Herndon Sidney Novoa Vanesa Martín-Arias Karen Dyson Kaitlin Walker Karis Tenneson David Saah |
| author_sort | Milagros Becerra |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Peru’s Southeastern Amazon deforestation trends can be attributed to alluvial gold mining. Illegal mining occurring in forestry concessions, national parks, and the territories of Indigenous People Organizations is of particular concern. We present a methodology to create near real-time alerts of deforestation caused by alluvial gold mining. A time series of Sentinel-1 Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) data from February to December 2022 is created in Google Earth Engine (GEE) and assessed using Morton Canty’s Omnibus Q-test change detection algorithm. Resulting detections are validated with high-resolution optical imagery from Planet NICFI’s monthly basemaps and Planet Scope daily imagery. The alerts identify the location and timing of large areas (group pixels of <1 ha) of forest loss due to gold mining activities within buffer zones of indigenous territories and protected areas. The overall accuracy of the forest loss analysis conducted with this change detection method was 99.98%, based on an independent accuracy assessment (table 2). This effort has resulted in a public web platform that displays the location of near real time alerts, so Peruvian enforcement agencies can more effectively allocate resources and staff to addressing active illegal mining operations. These results demonstrate the applicability of open-source SAR data to monitor forest loss over areas where cloud cover is more persistent and to improve tools that deliver timely, critical information to decision-makers. Future applications of our method could expand this approach to other drivers of deforestation. |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj-art-8e62abf119e94a7498afaa064fe49a50 |
| institution | Kabale University |
| issn | 2515-7620 |
| language | English |
| publishDate | 2024-01-01 |
| publisher | IOP Publishing |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Environmental Research Communications |
| spelling | doaj-art-8e62abf119e94a7498afaa064fe49a502025-01-02T14:01:03ZengIOP PublishingEnvironmental Research Communications2515-76202024-01-0161212502210.1088/2515-7620/ad937eCreating near real-time alerts of illegal gold mining in the Peruvian Amazon using Synthetic Aperture RadarMilagros Becerra0https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3581-7195Lucio Villa1https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4879-4060Andréa Puzzi Nicolau2https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7529-2074Kelsey E Herndon3https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4771-6861Sidney Novoa4https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3467-2780Vanesa Martín-Arias5https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1642-7845Karen Dyson6https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8860-3396Kaitlin Walker7https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3939-2465Karis Tenneson8https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5842-0663David Saah9https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9999-1219Conservación Amazónica - ACCA, Lima, Peru; SERVIR Amazonia, Cali 76001, Colombia; Clark University , Worcester, MA 01610, United States of AmericaGeospatialcode.cloud, Lima, PeruSERVIR Amazonia, Cali 76001, Colombia; Spatial Informatics Group, Pleasanton, CA, United States of AmericaUAH Earth System Science Center, University of Alabama Huntsville , Huntsville, AL, United States of America; NASA-USAID SERVIR Science Coordination Office, NASA Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, AL, United States of AmericaConservación Amazónica - ACCA, Lima, Peru; SERVIR Amazonia, Cali 76001, ColombiaUAH Earth System Science Center, University of Alabama Huntsville , Huntsville, AL, United States of America; NASA-USAID SERVIR Science Coordination Office, NASA Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, AL, United States of AmericaSERVIR Amazonia, Cali 76001, Colombia; Spatial Informatics Group, Pleasanton, CA, United States of AmericaUAH Earth System Science Center, University of Alabama Huntsville , Huntsville, AL, United States of America; NASA-USAID SERVIR Science Coordination Office, NASA Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, AL, United States of AmericaSERVIR Amazonia, Cali 76001, Colombia; Spatial Informatics Group, Pleasanton, CA, United States of AmericaSERVIR Amazonia, Cali 76001, Colombia; Spatial Informatics Group, Pleasanton, CA, United States of America; Geospatial Analysis Lab, University of San Francisco , San Francisco, CA, United States of AmericaPeru’s Southeastern Amazon deforestation trends can be attributed to alluvial gold mining. Illegal mining occurring in forestry concessions, national parks, and the territories of Indigenous People Organizations is of particular concern. We present a methodology to create near real-time alerts of deforestation caused by alluvial gold mining. A time series of Sentinel-1 Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) data from February to December 2022 is created in Google Earth Engine (GEE) and assessed using Morton Canty’s Omnibus Q-test change detection algorithm. Resulting detections are validated with high-resolution optical imagery from Planet NICFI’s monthly basemaps and Planet Scope daily imagery. The alerts identify the location and timing of large areas (group pixels of <1 ha) of forest loss due to gold mining activities within buffer zones of indigenous territories and protected areas. The overall accuracy of the forest loss analysis conducted with this change detection method was 99.98%, based on an independent accuracy assessment (table 2). This effort has resulted in a public web platform that displays the location of near real time alerts, so Peruvian enforcement agencies can more effectively allocate resources and staff to addressing active illegal mining operations. These results demonstrate the applicability of open-source SAR data to monitor forest loss over areas where cloud cover is more persistent and to improve tools that deliver timely, critical information to decision-makers. Future applications of our method could expand this approach to other drivers of deforestation.https://doi.org/10.1088/2515-7620/ad937eminingdeforestationchange detectionalgorithmtimely alertenforcement agencies |
| spellingShingle | Milagros Becerra Lucio Villa Andréa Puzzi Nicolau Kelsey E Herndon Sidney Novoa Vanesa Martín-Arias Karen Dyson Kaitlin Walker Karis Tenneson David Saah Creating near real-time alerts of illegal gold mining in the Peruvian Amazon using Synthetic Aperture Radar Environmental Research Communications mining deforestation change detection algorithm timely alert enforcement agencies |
| title | Creating near real-time alerts of illegal gold mining in the Peruvian Amazon using Synthetic Aperture Radar |
| title_full | Creating near real-time alerts of illegal gold mining in the Peruvian Amazon using Synthetic Aperture Radar |
| title_fullStr | Creating near real-time alerts of illegal gold mining in the Peruvian Amazon using Synthetic Aperture Radar |
| title_full_unstemmed | Creating near real-time alerts of illegal gold mining in the Peruvian Amazon using Synthetic Aperture Radar |
| title_short | Creating near real-time alerts of illegal gold mining in the Peruvian Amazon using Synthetic Aperture Radar |
| title_sort | creating near real time alerts of illegal gold mining in the peruvian amazon using synthetic aperture radar |
| topic | mining deforestation change detection algorithm timely alert enforcement agencies |
| url | https://doi.org/10.1088/2515-7620/ad937e |
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