Abstract
The ability of the ground penetrating radar (GPR) method as a rapid preliminary survey to detect the presence of illegally buried waste is presented in this paper. The test site is located in the countryside of “Sannicandro di Bari” (Southern Italy) and has a surface area of 1500 m2. A total of five parallel profiles were acquired in 2014 using a geophysical survey system instrument (GSSI) equipped with 400 and 200 MHz antennae in the monostatic configuration. Two of the five profiles were registered in a control area to compare a natural condition to a suspected waste buried zone. As a result of a processing and elaboration workflow, GPR investigations allowed us to interpret the signal qualitatively within a maximum depth of about 3 m, identifying many signal anomalies, whose characteristics can be considered typical of buried waste. The GPR response of the three profiles acquired in the suspected area showed substantial differences not found in the control’s profiles. Anomalies related to the presence of intense scattering, of dome structures not attributable to cavities, but rather to a flattening and compacting of different layers, therefore, less electrically conductive, were identified in the suspected area. The interpretation of the results obtained by the GPR profiles was confirmed by excavations carried out with bulldozers. Large quantities of solid waste illegally buried (e.g., waste deriving from construction and demolition activities, bituminous mixtures, discarded tires, glass, plastic, municipal waste) were revealed in all the sites where anomalies and non-conformities appeared compared to the control natural soil.
Highlights
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The goal of this paper is to present a challenging case study that demonstrates the potential of ground penetrating radar (GPR) on the identification of anomalies in the subsurface linked to the presence of suspected non-natural materials and waste illegally buried
Notwithstanding care on GPR data interpretation should be taken especially for differentiation between natural or geologic materials and anthropic buried items, we evaluated this technique as the most suitable in terms of fast spatial coverage, flexibility of usage, and reliability of results [14] that best fit our purpose and available resources
Summary
Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. Before applying decision-making and remedial strategies, the reclamation of a polluted site requires identifying illegal waste dumps. Conventional surveys via field sampling do not fit with the detection of buried wastes inexpensively and expeditiously. Several geophysical methods have been adopted to discover and locate suspected buried waste sites [1,2,3,4,5]
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