Abstract
The Tatun Volcano Group (TVG) is located at the northern coast of Taiwan Island with only 15 km to the Taipei metropolis. Recent geothermal and geochemical studies suggest that the TVG is dormant-active rather than extinct, implying the eruption potential to devastate the nearby area of 7 million inhabitants. Although some geodetic tools (e.g., global positioning system and precise leveling) have been utilized to analyze the activity associated with volcanism, it is still challenging for conventional interferometric synthetic aperture radar (InSAR) technique to obtain clear ground surface movement at the TVG due to decorrelation and complex atmospheric delay. In this study, we present an improved multi-temporal InSAR (MTInSAR) approach to explore the temporal evolution and spatial extent of displacement at the TVG from 19 L-band ALOS/PALSAR images acquired between 2007 and 2011. Stratified atmospheric delays and orbit error are corrected with a patch-based joint model as different phase components can be separated according to their distinct spatiotemporal characteristics. The spatial deformation patterns indicate an uplift of 10 mm/year at the SW-NE ridge and subsidence with a rate of 10 mm/year at the E-W ridge. The temporal deformation variations at Mt. Chihshin and Huangzuei have high similarity with correlation coefficients of 0.9 above. This indicates that the subsidence at Mts. Chihshin and Huangzuei might be caused by released hydrothermal fluids related to tectono-magmatic activity within the hydrothermal system beneath the TVG.
Highlights
T HE Tatun Volcano Group (TVG) is located at the northern tip of Taiwan adjacent to two metropolises (i.e., Taipei city and New Taipei city)
In order to validate the accuracy of Interferometric synthetic aperture radar (InSAR) measurements, we compare InSAR time-series displacements with global positioning system (GPS) displacements obtained from the Institute of Earth Science of Academia Sinica
Some transient deformation signals in GPS measurements are omitted by the InSAR data, this is resulted from limited availability of SAR data in 2009
Summary
T HE Tatun Volcano Group (TVG) is located at the northern tip of Taiwan adjacent to two metropolises (i.e., Taipei city and New Taipei city). From the general identification of active volcanoes [5], the TVG has been classified as an extinct volcano group, and some volcano subgroups thereof (e.g., Mt. Chihshin) have been proven to be potentially active according to recent geophysical and geochemical observations [6]−[8]. Considering 7 million inhabitants and two nuclear power plants are distributed in the vicinity of the TVG, any volcanic activity may have a significant impact on the surrounding area. Understanding the dynamic nature of volcanic activity at the TVG is a fundamental scientific issue and a societal need to mitigate damages from the possible eruptions
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