Using Advanced Synthetic Aperture Radar (ASAR) for Recognition of Coastal

Geomorphological Features and Land use Assessment in Part of Tamilnadu Coast.

G. BALAMURUGAN
Scientist-C
Center for Remote Sensing and Geoinformatics
Sathyabama University
Chennai - 600 119.

ABSTRACT

Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) images are being used more extensively than ever before for
geosciences Applications in the moist tropics. With SAR's side viewing geometry, longer wavelengths,
and almost all-weather sensing capability, SAR imagery has been extensively useful mapping tool for
coastal geomorphology in the moist tropics. The purpose of this study to assess the use of Multitemporal
C-band ENVISAT- ASAR data for identification of different coastal geomorphology in part of
Tamilnadu coast. The orbital ASAR data was digitally geometric corrected (ortho-rectified) and filtered
for speckle noise, and linearly stretched in order to enhance contrast between the coastal environment
features. By using the methods of crisp enhancement, linear stretching and PCA, to show the various
Coastal geomorphological units. The information extraction is based on recognition of the mechanism
interactions occurring between radar signal and the target on the ground, represented by shallow water
morphology in the intertidal conditions, coastal dunes, mangroves, marshes and highland. In an
application perspective, Orbital ASAR data proved to be a fundamental source of information for both
geomorphological mapping and land use pattern in moist tropical environments.

KEY WORDS: ASAR, Geomorphology, Mangroves, Land Cover, Coastal mapping.

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1. INTRODUCTION

The landforms along the Tamilnadu coast are complex and dynamic in nature. Their
developments are largely controlled by the interplay of various spatial and temporal factors including
wind, waves, tides and currents, coupled with geology, vegetation, climate and time. The coastal
processes of erosion, transport and deposition and their link to flooding and relative sea level changes
have continuously modified the coastal environment. Thus, the understanding of the landform
developments and an in-depth knowledge of the spatial and temporal changes are critical to characterize
the coastal zone, aiming at the protection of this sensitive tropical environment. Recent studies have
addressed the use of orbital Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) as an ideal data source for flooding,
wetland and hydrological studies in the Tamilnadu Coast (P. Shanmugam. 2003). The cloud penetration
ability and the day/night imaging capabilities allow valuable information to be extracted when data
acquired by conventional optical remote sensing imagery are restricted. The difference of SAR return
from land versus water is primarily a function of contrast of dielectric properties and surface roughness,
providing a striking interface which also facilitates coastal delineation and related mapping studies
(MacDonald et al. 1971, Lee and Jurkevich 1990, Ellis and Richmond 1991). With the advent of SAR-
satellite imageries, several studies focused on the use of orbital SAR data for coastal applications in the
moist tropics (Singhroy 1996, Barbosa et al. 1999, Kushwaha et al. 2000, Proysi et al. 2000). This paper
addresses the importance of using old and new SAR data acquired from ENVISAT, for coastal studies in
part of Tamilnadu coast focusing on geomorphological mapping and land-cover assessments.

2. STUDY AREA

The Pitchavaram coastal wetland is situated on the southeastern coastal part of Peninsular India
and represents a heterogeneous mixture of mangrove wetland ecosystem. It lies between the coordinates
of latitude 11° 20’ 00’’ N to 11° 30’ 00’’ N and longitude 79° 45’ 00’’ E to 79° 51’ 00’’ E. It is an
estuarine type of mangrove wetland ecosystem, situated at the end of a canal called Uppanar, which is a
distributory of the Coleroon River. The Pitchavaram mangroves are connected to the Vellar estuary in
the north and Coleroon estuary in the south along with the Killai lagoon by a well-developed backwater
system (Figure.1). This area is often referred to as the Vellar-Coleroon estuarine complex, which
includes various geomorphological features such as beach ridges, coastal sandunes, mangroves, marsh,
scrub, mudflat, aquaculture, lagoon, beach, and other associated land cover features such as agricultural

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vegetation, plantation and fallow lands, etc. Thus, large areas of the lowlands are flooded during spring
tides due to both rainfalls with high runoff rates and tidal effects. On one hand, strong tidal currents
from east to west and waves 1.5 m high are responsible for the erosion of mangroves along the coast,
estuaries and bays, where lines of fallen mangrove trees mark the eroded sites. On the other hand, new
mangrove fringes are prograding seaward in response to muddy sedimentation.

INDIA

Vellarestuary

Pichavaram Mangroves

Chidambaram

Coleroon estuary
Coleroon River

Figure1. Location map of the study area.

Quaternary deposits controlled by the geometry and paleotopography of the study area.
Topographically, the study site is a low relief terrain. The tidal flat, including a mangrove system, is
characterized by local slopes varying with topographic breaks dissected by creeks. Salt marshes
constitute the highest areas of the coastal plain with a topographic relief reaching 3 m above the mean
tidal level, while intertidal mangroves are related to relief variations from 2 to 2.6 m. Supratidal
mangroves are associated with altitude variations from 2.6 to 2.8mabove the mean tidal level.
The original vegetation of the coastal plain is typical of the tropical rain forest. This vegetation
cover has been affected by anthropogenic activities, such as agriculture and human settlements.
Mangrove forest is found on the tidal flat, grasses occur along the marshes and abusive vegetation
occupies the Chenier sand ridges, dunes and backshore zone of the barrier-beach ridges. The area can be
subdivided into three main geomorphologic compartments: (1) Alluvial plain; (2) Estuarine plain; and
(3) Coastal plain, with salt marshes (inner and outer), tidal flats (supratidal mangroves, intertidal
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mangroves, muddy and sandy tidal flats), Chenier sand ridges, coastal dunes, barrier-beach ridges and
ebb-tidal delta environments (Figure 1). The coastal plain is extremely irregular, with jagged nature of
this low gradient coast.

3. DATA SET AND IMAGE PROCESSING

The investigation was based on spaceborne ASAR images. The SAR’s ability to delineate the
land/water boundary and to map geomorphological features and flooded vegetation is largely dependent
on the incident angle (Leconte and Pultz 1991, Lewis et al. 1998). In low relief environments, small
incidence angles (10 to 25 degrees from vertical) will produce the maximum relief enhancement, but
larger incidence angles (25 to 59 degrees) will also result in acceptable terrain rendition by increasing
the terrain textural contrasts (Singhroy and Saint- Jean 1999). Normally, the coastline delineation is best
achieved using large incidence angle (25-59 degrees) due to the high contrast in radar return from land
(surface and volume scattering mechanisms) and water (specular reflection mechanism). However,
surface variations and flooded vegetation are best-characterized using small incidence angle (25- 40
degrees). Details of the ASAR data used in the investigation are presented in the Table I.
Table I. Characteristics of the ASAR data.
Acquisition Angle of Spatial
Platform Incidence Polarization Band Wavelength
Sensor date resolution (m)
(deg) CM

15-06-2005 30 X 30
ENVISAR ASAR 31-05-2006 15 - 45 V/ V C- band 5.7
26-04-2006

Digital image processing was carried out using ERDAS imagine 8.7 Software. Previous studies
shown that some procedures need to be applied to SAR due to the unique radar viewing geometry,
causing specific induced-relief geometric distortions and the presence of speckle (Paradella et al. 1998,
2000). Thus, the orbital data was initially scaled from 16 to 8 bits. Due to the fact that the area is related
to an extremely low topographic relief, the ENVISAT- ASAR image was geometrically corrected
through an ortho-rectification scheme assuming a flat terrain model.

3.1. Speckle Filtering

A major problem in SAR images is the presence of speckle noise, which is a consequence of the
coherent nature of the radiation emitted by radars, allowing contributions from many point scatterers
within the footprint to combine both constructively and destructively, producing light and dark pixels in

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the image from regions which are homogeneous on the ground (Rees 1990). The reduction of speckle is
therefore a fundamental first step in processing SAR data for many applications.
Various filtering processes were performed to reduce speckle: Lee, Frost, and GAMMA-MAP were
successively tried and evaluated in empirical approach. Hear the lee- filter, which estimates the
unspeckled pixel value by optimizing the criteria of minimum square error (MMES), was used for
speckle reduction in an ASAR image. The frost one, with a 3/3 window, gave the best results. Figure 3
showing the 2D plot of pixel value for selecting the most suitable filter for speckle suppression in ASAR
image. The filter operation was controlled by checking for the coefficient of variation and the image
degradation visually.
Out of all the filter tested, the GAMMA-MAP filter (Lopes et al., 1993) was found the best one
as besides speckle reduction, it preservers the textural information and at the same time results in good
enhancement of geomorphological features present in the image Figure 3. Finally, the image was
linearly stretched in order to enhance contrasts between the coastal features, and visually interpreted
based on conventional photointerpretation keys (tone, texture, pattern, form, size and context). The main
steps of the digital image processing are presented in the flow chart of Figure 2.

ENVISAT- ASAR
Input Data 16 bites

Scaling of
16 bits - 8 bits

Pre-Processing
Geometric correction

Speckle reduction

Processing FCC Linear Stretch PCA

RADAR Geomorphologic Field check

Assessment Interpretation
of ASAR Products

Figure 2. Flow chart with the main steps of ASAR image processing.

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 Frost Filter Raw image Gamma-MAP
filter

Figure 3. Showing the 2D plot of pixel value for selecting the most suitable filter for speckle suppression
in ASAR image.

3.2. Surface Backscattering Blockdiagrams

Surface roughness is usually linked to the strength of the backscattered signal. In order to
characterise typical surfaces, backscatter quantities can be reported as 3rd dimension and displayed as a
block diagram. The surface characteristics have been further enhanced by colour-coding the backscatter
values. By studying its spatial distribution a classification of surfaces or soils can be attempted. Figure. 4
A1 and A2 show such block diagrams. The pixel values indicate surface roughness such as smooth (low
pixel value) or rough (high pixel values) but also relief characteristics (change in the local incidence
angle and hence change in radiometric response). It has to be noted that also any alteration in pixel
spacing or filtering will modify the characteristics of a sample. The pixel value distribution in Figure. 4
A1 and A correspond to surface properties of coastal sandunes the bright tones, being close to the values
of high backscattering. Darkest values throughout the scenes have been found to be close to low
backscattering. Surface backscattering samples displayed as pseudo-coloured block diagram basically
illustrate the interaction between radar energy and surface as smooth or rough terrain. The smooth
surface reflects all energy away from the antenna and practically no energy is returned, resulting in a

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dark image tone. The surface with intermediate roughness reflects part of the energy and scatters the
remainder, resulting to medium gray tones.

A A1

B B1

Figure 4. Radar data samples displayed as pseudo-coloured block diagram. a) Sandunes,b) Mangroves.

4. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

4.1 Coastal Geomorphological Mapping

Geoscientists make use of the same clues for radar analysis that are applied for visual
interpretation of aerial photographs and the identification of forms and the interpretation of processes
rely mainly on image tonal and textural attributes. Texture describes the arrangement of spatial patterns
or variation in tone within an area of the image. Based on visual interpretation of the ENVISAT - ASAR
image, the following six prominent geomorphological coastal features were detected and examined in
detail. In addition, the orbital ASAR data was also evaluated to identify coastal environment features
(Figures 5 and 6).

Mangroves – The use of SAR imagery for the delineation and mapping of mangrove forests
along tropical coasts is normally facilitate due to a high contrast with water. A smooth body of water is a
specular reflector, reflecting most of the incident microwave energy away from the sensor (very dark
grey tones). Areas not covered by water are diffuse scatters, returning a larger proportion of incident
microwave energy to the antenna (intermediate tones). In the case of flooded vegetated areas

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the radar signal, which reaches the water, is reflected away and interacts with trunks and vice versa,
forming corner reflectors, thus resulting in a larger amount of the signal being returned to the sensor
(bright tones). The mangrove ecosystem in the area has a width of about 20 km and is densely covered
by forests located from the high spring tide to the mean tidal level. The ASAR image interpretation has
indicated that intertidal mangroves (trees 5 to10 m height) show microwave responses controlled by the
vegetation cover (volume scattering) and by water/ trunk interaction (double-bounce effects); this is
responsible for a very rough image texture and light gray tones allowing their discrimination (Figure 3).
The supratidal mangrove presents a similar behavior, however mangrove trees are smaller and spaced,
presenting a reduced double-bounce effects. As expected, the image texture related to this target is finer
and dark-grayish (Figure.5a).
The output product of IHS transformation of temporal ASAR data i.e., June, 2005; and April and
May, 2006, (Figure.5b) highlights the mangrove vegetation in pink and blue colour corresponding to
mangroves categories, namely dense and degraded, respectively. However, other than above mentioned
aspect, there appears to be no major difference between the raw SAR data FCC and the IHS transformed
image.
Salt marshes – The inner and outer marshes are situated in the supratidal zone and are mainly
flooded during equinoctial tides, with sedimentation marked by mud deposition carried from tidal fluxes
along creeks. The ASAR image clearly outlines the marshes. The inner marsh, completely flooded in the
rainy season, is related to a very dark tone in the SAR image due to a quasi-specular response when the
radar signal interacts with water and aquatic vegetation (Figure 5a). The inner marsh also presents areas
dominated by a grass-coverage; hence the microwave responses in the image are associated to a slightly
rougher surface with lighter gray tones (Figure 5a). Finally, the outer marsh presents the similar image
pattern to the inner one, indicating the same scattering mechanism.

Barrier-dune beach ridges, tidal sandflats – These clastic sedimentary coastal environments
are the most dynamic of the study area and deserve special attention because they represent one of the
most sensitive indicators of coastal changes and processes. Coastal sand dunes consist of sandy
sediments of tidal shoals and beaches reworked by the wind and are currently migrating landward over
the mangrove deposits in the intertidal mudflats. Transverse and pyramidal dunes are composed of well-
sorted and very fine quartz sands and are partially or completely covered by vegetation. The beach
ridges extend from the low spring tidal levels to coastal dune-beach scarps that represent the higher
spring tidal level in the intertidal beach.

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 1 A B
2

4
5

3A

Figure 5. Digitally enhanced ASAR images. A. Linear Stretched ASAR image, B. Intensity, hue and
saturation transformed from Multitemporal FCC image highlights the mangroves.

A C

B D

Figure 6. Detailed coastal geomorphology of Chidambaram Coastal plain from ASAR. A. Meandering
river and Coastal sandunes, B. Pallar Estuary, C. Mangroves, D. Mudflats.

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 The beach ridges extend from the low spring tidal levels to coastal dune-beach scarps that
represent the higher spring tidal level in the intertidal beach. The beaches have a linear and elongated
form along a North-south direction, with curved spits in the long shore sediment transport direction. The
beach ridges play a key role in the protection of the backward areas, which are characterized by the
presence of slack water muddy sediments, salt grasses, and mangrove trees. Tidal sandflats occur along
the coast between mean tidal and low spring tidal levels. Sandy tidal shoals with abundant ripples, mega
ripple marks, and sand waves exposed at low tide are typical representatives of this unit. Ebb deltas
extend seaward from tidal creeks in the form of large tidal deltas and are related to shallow waters
during high tides.
In the SARA scene, these coastal features are shown as smooth and very dark image patterns
close to shoreline (Figure 5a) due to specular scattering mechanism of the microwave radiation by the
water. As a consequence, the landforms discrimination is poor and it will be solely recognized at low
tide when they become exposed. Table II summarizes the assessment of the ASAR image performance
for coastal geomorphological features and land-cover mapping for the Chidambaram area.

Table II. Interpretation of ASAR image for coastal geomorphological mapping.

Coastal geomorphological ASAR image interpretation results
features and land-cover
Estuary Part of the lower river course that is attached by the mixing of salt
water and fresh water.

Coastal dunes Linear features up to 5 m high covered by arbustive vegetation.

Slightly rough surface and dark tones on the ASAR image.
Mangrove Coastal areas dominated by forest with average trees of 10 m high.
Mangroves are associated light gray tone and very coarse texture.
(Double-bounce).
Mudflats Coastal low-lying and water logged terrain covered by grasses.
Slightly rough surface and dark tones on the SAR image.
Barrier-beach ridge Linear and flat features in the intertidal zone without vegetation.
Smooth surface and very dark gray tones on the SAR texture.
Regenerated mangrove Coastal mangrove forest deforested and now subject to regenerative
process. Rough texture and highlight tones due to corner reflection.
Paddy Lands Standing water with wave action appears as light gray tone and
medium texture.
Other vegetations Vegetable crops provide high microwave return and appear as
very light gray tone and coarse texture
Settlements coarse texture and very light to bright white tone with irregular shape

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4.2. Mapping of coastal land cover

The Chidambaram Coastal Plain has suffered fast and dramatic changes in the landscape. The
ASAR imagery has shown to be valorous in providing information to produce and update coastal land
cover maps in this tropical environment, covered by clouds during all time. The interpretation of the
ASAR image has allowed the mapping of changing land cover. Flat and linear features bounded by
mangrove forest, depicting as smooth surfaces with very dark tones, characterize the roads. Specular
scattering is observed within the deforested mangrove areas, where high spring tides flood the muddy
sediments (Figure 7). The natural regenerated mangrove sites present sparse and short vegetation
distributed over flat muddy morphology. These factors favor the backscattered signal strength controlled
by "corner reflector" mechanisms, producing high radar returns. Thus, this target shows a rough texture
with high light gray tones (Figure 7). In a specific place, an artificial lake was formed due to a tidal
creek damping by road.
The microwave responses of paddy lands with standing crop have been found to vary with the
density of crop cover. The standing water with wave action appears as light gray tone and medium
texture. In sparsely vegetated paddy lands the incident microwave energy interacts with the crop canopy
and through openings reaches the water surface wherefrom it scatters back through paddy canopy
resulting in 'double bounce' effect and thereby imparting, relatively lighter tone (medium gray) and
smooth texture in the SAR image. In areas with dense paddy crops, light gray tone and medium texture
has been observed as back scattering takes place only from crop canopy.
The horticultural plantation, seasonal vegetable crops with fully-established canopies scatter a
major portion of incident microwave energy. Depending upon density of vegetation, canopy geometry
and volume, different degrees of scattering involving scattering from canopy top, canopy volume and
background scattering takes place. Consequently, orchards and vegetable crops provide high microwave
return and appear as very light gray tone and coarse texture. Amongst vegetation, the mangroves exhibit
the characteristic response and are seen in the SAR image as light gray tone and very coarse texture. The
settlements appear as coarse texture and very light to bright white tone with irregular shape since the
settlement structures serve as a corner reflector for the incident microwave energy.

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 1
A B

3
2

Figure 7. A. Gamma-MAP filtered ASAR image, B. ASAR color composite image (June, 2005; and
April and May, 2006) highlights the different land covers.

1 3

2 4

Figure 8. Land cover of Chidambaram Coastal plain from ASAR. A. Aquaculture and other vegetations,
B. Paddy field, C. Regenerated mangrove, D. Settlements.

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5. CONCLUSIONS AND OBSERVATIONS

This paper has addressed the ENVISAT - ASAR capability to provide unique geomorphological
and land cover mapping of the Chidambaram Coastal Plain. Sedimentary dynamic, tidal current, wave
action and estuarine and tidal channel displacements have played an important role in controlling these
coastal changes. Radar signatures in C-band can be used as a source of information to identify different
geomorphological units. Different processing techniques and methods have been used to produce
optimized products for image interpretation. From this study, conclude that the potential use of filtering
techniques in different data sets for more accurate mapping of highly fragile coastal zone. These include
pseudo-coloured surface backscatter block diagrams and 3-D radar data perspective viewings. Main
application for these products includes the identification of coastal sand dunes, beach ridges, mangroves,
mudflats etc., Based on results obtained from ASAR data analysis conclude that SAR imageries have
provided valuable, rapid and accurate information on coastal features recognition, coastal land-use
assessment, and base maps updating. The future work will focus on the use of different SAR systems
(with multiband and multi-polarizations) for improved understanding of the coastal geomorphological
features.

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