Abstract
Abstract Vegetation health monitoring is key to identifying early signs of water stress, pollutant-induced toxicity, and plant diseases in green urban stormwater facilities. However, rigorous monitoring to collect accurate quantitative data is an expensive and time-consuming process. This paper examines the feasibility of using uninhabited aircraft systems (UAS), in comparison to standard ground-based methods, for monitoring biomass and primary production in two bioswale cells at an urban stormwater facility. Implementation of the UAS-based approach involved flight planning in an urban area to meet resolution requirements of bioswale imagery obtained from near-infrared and red-green-blue cameras. The resulting normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) estimated from UAS data was tracked over a 2-month period during the transition from spring to summer, showing the spatial distribution of NDVI and the change in vegetation coverage areas over time. In comparison, ground-based measurements of the fraction of intercepted photosynthetically active radiation (PAR) presented multiple practical challenges during implementation in the field, leading to over- and underestimates of intercepted PAR. Overall, UAS-derived NDVI was found to be a valuable reflectance-based, vegetation health-monitoring methodology that can be used by utilities and cities for practical, cost-effective, and rapid assessment of vegetation stress and for long-term maintenance in green stormwater facilities.
Highlights
Green infrastructure (GI) for stormwater management is an attractive solution for urban municipalities, serving to reduce urban flooding and treat contaminated stormwater, while simultaneously providing aesthetically pleasing spaces in urban areas
Plants play a vital role in GI facilities by helping reduce the flow velocity of stormwater, providing nutrients to the microbial communities in the soil, maintaining soil permeability, and taking up contaminants that infiltrate the soil in stormwater runoff (USEPA ; Akpor & Muchie )
Previous work on monitoring vegetation in GI in practice has primarily been limited to the identification, location, and description of vegetation density and height, with no detailed methodology included beyond a visual inspection of these plant-based elements at GI facilities such as bioswales, bioretention systems, raingardens, and green roofs (USEPA, )
Summary
Green infrastructure (GI) for stormwater management is an attractive solution for urban municipalities, serving to reduce urban flooding and treat contaminated stormwater, while simultaneously providing aesthetically pleasing spaces in urban areas. Plants play a vital role in GI facilities by helping reduce the flow velocity of stormwater, providing nutrients to the microbial communities in the soil, maintaining soil permeability, and taking up contaminants that infiltrate the soil in stormwater runoff (USEPA ; Akpor & Muchie ). To support function and performance of plants in GI, vegetation health-monitoring practices must be established. Methods for monitoring the health of urban GI vegetation are not well studied. Previous work on monitoring vegetation in GI in practice has primarily been limited to the identification, location, and description of vegetation density and height, with no detailed methodology included beyond a visual inspection of these plant-based elements at GI facilities such as bioswales, bioretention systems, raingardens, and green roofs (USEPA , )
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