Bikesh Twanabasu

[email protected]
Assignment 02 - Due: Firday, February 3
Universitat Jaume I, Master in Geospatial Technologies SIW007 –
Introduction to Remote Sensing – 2016/201

1. Define impervious surface

Impervious surface are generally defined as any surface that water cannot infiltrate and are primarily
associated with human activities. Most urban infrastructures such as roads, sidewalks, driveways,
parking lots and buildings are impervious. The infiltration of these surface is zero or near to zero.

2. Describe how near infrared imagery can be used to determine impervious surfaces (1)
Process steps (2) Reason why this works (based on spectral reflectance)

There can be different methods to determine impervious surface from near infrared imagery. Some
of them are described below:

a) Process 1
i. First of all Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) is calculated using the formula
NDVI = (NIR – Red)/(NIR + Red)
ii. The NDVI is then classified between vegetated and non-vegetated area using some
threshold value. Generally we use hit and trial method to identify the best suitable
threshold value for the imagery.
iii. Normalized Difference Water Index (NDWI) is calculated to find out the areas covered
by water using the formula NDWI = (Green - NIR)/(Green + NIR).
iv. The non-vegetated area in the urban area after removing the area covered by water
surface can be considered as impervious surface. And also, we can classify the
remaining non-vegetated area using classification methods if there are surface like bare
soil, wetlands, etc.

Reason why this works

As the vegetation absorb red light for photosynthesis, the vegetation has low reflectance for red
band and has higher reflectance for NIR band. So, vegetation can be identified from higher value
of NDVI. And from the spectral curve, we can see that only in the case of water, the reflectance
is more in Green band than that in NIR band. Thus the positive values that we get from above
formula to calculate NDWI can be identified as area covered with water.

b) Process 2
Impervious surface can also be determined by calculating Normalized Difference Impervious
Index (NDII) or Normalized Difference Impervious Surface Index (NDISI) using the formula
NDII = (Vis – TIR) / (Vis + TIR) where Vis is visible band such as TM bands 1, 2 and 3.

NDISI = (TIR - (Visible + NIR + MIR)/3) / (TIR + (Visible + NIR + MIR)/3)

Reason why this works

Impervious surfaces have higher reflectance and temperature than vegetation because
impervious materials have a strong capability to emit heat, which is impossible for vegetation.
Therefore, the ratio of thermal band to a NIR band should greatly enhance impervious surface
features.

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3. Provide a brief explanation how impervious surface analysis is used

Over the past centuries, urbanization and growing commercial and residential development has
substantially increased the proportion of impervious areas. As the impervious surface does not allow
runoff to seep into the ground, it has great impact on increased water runoff. So in order to mitigate
the potential threats from extreme weather events and promote sustainable urban planning, decision
makers and practitioners needs to know where all the excess water goes. And the information about
the amount, location and types of impervious surface will be required in order to run spatially
distributed hydrological models. Thus the results from impervious surface analysis can be used to
evaluate the effects on storm water runoff by future climatic and as well as urban developments.

And also, impervious surface analysis is critical to understanding its impact on the environment.
Impervious pavements deprive tree roots of aeration, eliminating the “urban forest” and canopy shade
that would otherwise moderate urban climate thus reducing ecological productivity and interrupt
atmospheric carbon cycle.

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Practical – City of Bellingham color infrared data

Figure 1: Light Gray Canvas Basemap with Data Frame Coordinate System

Figure 2: Color Infrared Image over basemap at the scale 1:24000

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Here, in the color infrared aerial photo, the band information is as follows:
Band 1: NIR
Band 2: Red
Band 3: Green

Figure 3: NDVI computation and its result

Figure 4: Using Raster calculator to differentiate Vegetated and Non-vegetated area at the threshold of 0.3
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Figure 5: Vegetated and Non-Vegetated Area

In the above figure, the green color represents vegetated area when we use the threshold of 0.3 to the
NDVI.

Figure 6: Dialog box showing the function chain to create pseudo natural color image

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Figure 7: The pseudo natural color image created from above function

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Practical – Spectral signatures
Follow the workbook project starting in page 71 (Investigating spectral signatures of Las Vegas, Nevada.
Run Steps 1 and 2.

1. Page 73, tables Q4 and Q5 filled with your own data. Spectral signatures graph (either in excel or
ArcGIS – your choice)

Grass Average Water Average Concrete Average

Band # Band Name
B10 Blue 97 105 102 101 72 83 78 78 143 140 136 140
B20 Green 49 51 49 50 28 32 30 30 72 70 65 69
B30 Red 50 55 52 52 23 30 24 26 92 83 77 84
B40 NearInfrared_1 151 146 132 143 16 21 19 19 85 73 66 75
B50 NearInfrared_2 132 135 115 127 15 25 18 19 154 126 108 129
B70 MidInfrared 50 55 47 51 11 15 12 13 85 79 69 78

Band Band Name Grass Water Concrete

B10 Blue 101 78 140
B20 Green 50 30 69
B30 Red 52 26 84
B40 Near Infrared_1 143 19 75
B50 Near Infrared_2 127 19 129
B70 Mid Infrared 51 13 78

Figure 8: Spectral Signature Graph for Grass, Water and Concrete

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2. Page 74, tables Q10 and Q11filled with your own data. Spectral signatures graph (either in excel
or ArcGIS – your choice)

Evergreen Average Shrub_Scrub Average

Band # Band Name
B10 Blue 87 86 94 89 116 113 112 114
B20 Green 40 44 46 43 61 59 60 60
B30 Red 44 52 52 49 80 73 77 77
B40 NearInfrared_1 60 66 71 66 81 76 79 79
B50 NearInfrared_2 86 99 114 100 165 155 159 160
B70 Mid Infrared 48 52 66 55 93 86 89 89

Band Band Name Evergreen Shrub_Scrub

B10 Blue 89 114
B20 Green 43 60
B30 Red 49 77
B40 Near Infrared_1 66 79
B50 Near Infrared_2 100 160
B70 Mid Infrared 55 89

Figure 9: Spectral Signature Graph for Evergreen and Shrub_scrub