The Environmental Impacts of Oil and Gas Industry: Potential and Limits of Remote Sensing Methods

Dear Colleagues,

This Special Issue focuses on the role of earth observation (EO) data and remote sensing (RS) techniques for the identification and assessment of environmental impacts of both onshore and offshore oil and gas (OG) activities on air, water, soil, and ecosystems.

The oil and gas industry is a significant source of threats to the environment. Despite this, the demand for these non-renewable resources remains high. The issue of environmental sustainability is a major concern for governments and players from the oil and gas industry worldwide, which are both engaged in promoting environmentally sound industrial development. To this aim, accurate knowledge of impacts, risks, and possible accidents that may arise from these activities is fundamental to reducing pollution from OG activities and their impacts on human and society. Substantial challenges remain in obtaining timely and accurate information about these phenomena.

Within this context, one promising method of addressing this issue is to use EO systems, recognized as effective tools for surveying the environment. The synergistic use of EO-derived data and the integration with ground-level observations are becoming a fundamental requirement for identifying pollution sources from oil and gas platforms, tracking their emissions over time, and measuring and monitoring local to global sustainable development policies and programs.

The purpose of this Special Issue is to collect research articles addressing this complex and multifaceted topic, with particular reference to:

• Exploring the current earth observation capabilities in providing an overview of the environmental status and of trends over time seen in relation to OG activities;
• Analyzing the capabilities and drawbacks of satellite data (both optical and synthetic aperture radar (SAR)) and methods for detecting, characterizing, and estimating all impacts (environmental, social, economic) of OG activities.

Dr. Mariapia Faruolo
Dr. Valeria Satriano
Guest Editors

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