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Remote Sensing for Oil and Gas Development, Production and Monitoring

A special issue of Remote Sensing (ISSN 2072-4292). This special issue belongs to the section "Environmental Remote Sensing".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (31 October 2024) | Viewed by 1505

Special Issue Editors


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Guest Editor
Department of Earth, Ocean and Atmospheric Science, Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL 32306, USA
Interests: oil and gas monitoring; deep-sea ecology; image processing; remote sensing; GIS

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Guest Editor
Exxon Mobil Corporation, Spring, TX 77389, USA
Interests: petroleum geochemistry; hydrocarbon migration; oil and gas seepage; basin evolution; oil slicks

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

The detection and quantification of hydrocarbon in the ocean or atmosphere using remote sensing has rapidly improved in resolution and coverage. There have been extensive advances in Earth observation (EO) sensors, including space-borne high-resolution multispectral ones, polarimetric synthetic aperture radar (SAR), and unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). The data from these platforms are widely analyzed to study economic oil and gas reserves as well as monitor and respond to oil pollution and fugitive methane emissions. This has led to an improved understanding of the fundamental processes that govern basin properties, the natural release of hydrocarbons, and how these may be affected by climate changes and other developments. Algorithm and AI techniques will be crucial for processing the very large datasets generated by the ever-expanding data volumes. An important facet of this research are approaches that validate or calibrate the instruments and methods used for remote sensing using ground-truth measurements of natural releases or anthropogenic discharges quantified at their sources.

This Special Issue will explore new trends in algorithm development, image processing, and applications of remote sensing in mapping and environmental monitoring related to oil and gas discovery, production, and transport, including the detection of fugitive methane. The topics include, but are not limited to:

  • Maritime oil spill contamination detection, mapping, and responses;
  • The combination of EO, UAV, and SAR data to monitor oil-/gas-related activities;
  • The mapping of oil/gas exploration caused linear (e.g., seismic lines) and areal (e.g., well site) disturbances;
  • Models and methods for quantifying methane releases from natural and anthropogenic sources.

Prof. Dr. Ian Rosman MacDonald
Dr. William P. Meurer
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Remote Sensing is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2700 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • oil spill
  • oil slicks
  • earth observation
  • synthetic aperture radar (SAR) and unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs)
  • petroleum geochemistry
  • oil and gas seepage

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Published Papers (1 paper)

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Research

21 pages, 8197 KiB  
Article
Quantifying the Impact of Crude Oil Spills on the Mangrove Ecosystem in the Niger Delta Using AI and Earth Observation
by Jemima O’Farrell, Dualta O’Fionnagáin, Abosede Omowumi Babatunde, Micheal Geever, Patricia Codyre, Pearse C. Murphy, Charles Spillane and Aaron Golden
Remote Sens. 2025, 17(3), 358; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs17030358 - 22 Jan 2025
Viewed by 427
Abstract
The extraction, processing and transport of crude oil in the Niger Delta region of Nigeria has long been associated with collateral environmental damage to the largest mangrove ecosystem in Africa. Oil pollution is impacting not only one of the planet’s most ecologically diverse [...] Read more.
The extraction, processing and transport of crude oil in the Niger Delta region of Nigeria has long been associated with collateral environmental damage to the largest mangrove ecosystem in Africa. Oil pollution is impacting not only one of the planet’s most ecologically diverse regions but also the health, livelihoods, and social cohesion of the Delta region inhabitants. Quantifying and directly associating localised oil pollution events to specific petrochemical infrastructure is complicated by the difficulty of monitoring such vast and complex terrain, with documented concerns regarding the thoroughness and impartiality of reported oil pollution events. Earth Observation (EO) offers a means to deliver such a monitoring and assessment capability using Normalised Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) measurements as a proxy for mangrove biomass health. However, the utility of EO can be impacted by persistent cloud cover in such regions. To overcome such challenges here, we present a workflow that leverages EO-derived high-resolution (10 m) synthetic aperture radar data from the Sentinel-1 satellite constellation combined with machine learning to conduct observations of the spatial land cover changes associated with oil pollution-induced mangrove mortality proximal to pipeline networks in a 9000 km2 region of Rivers State located near Port Harcourt. Our analysis identified significant deforestation from 2016–2024, with an estimated mangrove mortality rate of 5644 hectares/year. Using our empirically derived Pipeline Impact Indicator (PII), we mapped the oil pipeline network to 1 km resolution, highlighting specific pipeline locations in need of immediate intervention and restoration, and identified several new pipeline sites showing evidence of significant oil spill damage that have yet to be formally reported. Our findings emphasise the critical need for the continuous and comprehensive monitoring of oil extractive regions using satellite remote sensing to support decision-making and policies to mitigate environmental and societal damage from pipeline oil spills, particularly in ecologically vulnerable regions such as the Niger Delta. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Remote Sensing for Oil and Gas Development, Production and Monitoring)
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