Application of the Marine Oil Spill Surveillance by Satellite Remote Sensing

Abstract

Oil spill accidents are seen relatively frequent and becomes a severe threat to coastal and marine ecosystems and water quality. Thus, active surveillance and rapid response to marine oil spills is important and essential to environment protection. So, this paper lays emphasis on the research of monitoring the marine oil spills for application by satellite remote sensing especially SAR. Imaging characteristics of satellites and image-forming principle of oil spill information in remote sensing images are analyzed at first. Then how to monitor the marine oil spills by satellite remote sensing and how to identify and detect marine oil spills information in SAR images are discussed mainly. Through the practical applications examples of the marine oil spill surveillance by satellite remote sensing in oil spill accidents of oil tanker “Hebei Spirit”, the method this paper proposed is proved to be very effectively and feasibly for the fast response and detection to oil spills especially in the waters near Bohai sea of China. Finally future development of marine oil spill surveillance is suggested with conclusion.