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SPECTRAL MONITORING OF FUGITIVE CONTAMINANTS IN THE ENVIRONMENT
Citation:
Slonecker, E T. AND J G. Lyon. SPECTRAL MONITORING OF FUGITIVE CONTAMINANTS IN THE ENVIRONMENT. Presented at US EPA Environmental Monitoring Technology Conference, Boston, MA, September 19-20, 2000.
Impact/Purpose:
The objectives of this task are to:
Assess new remote sensing technology for applicability to landscape characterization; Integrate multiple sensor systems data for improved landscape characterization;
Coordinate future technological needs with other agencies' sensor development programs;
Apply existing remote sensing systems to varied landscape characterization needs; and
Conduct remote sensing applications research for habitat suitability, water resources, and terrestrial condition indicators.
Description:
The accidental or intentional release of hazardous chemical substances into the environment is an inevitable consequence of anthropogenic activity. The detection, monitoring and remediation of fugitive contaminants is a major risk factor for human and ecological health and is regulated by several major environmental statutes such as the Clean Water Act, the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act and the Comprehensive Environmental Response Compensation and Liability Act, among others. Hazardous waste and related issues cost the Nation billions of dollars annually, and involves thousands of active and abandoned hazardous waste facilities. Monitoring the extent and distribution of contaminants in the soil, water and vegetation is most often accomplished by way of in situ sampling and time-consuming and costly laboratory analysis methods. However, recent advances in remote sensing science, using hyperspectral imaging technology, allow the collection of hundreds of very narrow bandwidth channels across the solar reflected spectrum and can be analyzed using standard spectroscopic analysis techniques. The result is that many substances can now be identified based on their unique spectral fingerprint in the solar reflected spectrum. However, outside the laboratory, pure substances are rare and most fugitive contaminants exist in a matrix of materials that includes vegetation coverage, which is often a dominant factor from a landscape or overhead remote sensing perspective. The ability to detect contaminants in the environment through changes in vegetation reflectance would be a major advance in environmental monitoring technology. This presentation will discuss past and future use of hyperspectral remote sensing and reflectance spectroscopy to identify hazardous materials in the environment through detection of changes in vegetation reflectance at known hazardous waste sites.