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An Oil Slick Detection Index Based on Landsat 8 Remote Sensing Images

Conference Paper · September 2018

DOI: 10.1109/BGDDS.2018.8626850

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AN OIL SLICK DETECTION INDEX BASED ON LANDSAT 8 REMOTE SENSING IMAGES

Dong Zhao 1, Xinwen Cheng 1, *, Hongping Zhang 1,2, Haitao Zhang 3

1
Faculty of Information Engineering, China University of Geosciences, Wuhan, China
zhaodong@cug.edu.cn, chxw377@126.com, yx_zhping@126.com
2
Wuhan University of Engineering Science, Wuhan, China - yx_zhping@126.com
3
College of Resources and Environment, Henan University of Economics and Law, Zhengzhou, China -
zht_410728@126.com
ABSTRACT
It is important to detect oil slicks from the sea. Compared to
traditional multispectral imager, such as MODIS, MERIS,
and AVHRR, operational land imager (OLI) on Landsat 8
satellite is more suitable for detecting floating oil slicks for
its high signal-noise ratio. However, traditional detection
indices were not generic for oil slicks from different sources
in different seas using OLI images. To precisely detect them,
this paper proposed an index, named Landsat 8 oil slick
detection index (L8OSDI), to identify oil slicks using
Landsat 8 OIL images. Three images of different sea areas
with oil slicks from different sources were used to test the
applicability and superiority of L8OSDI. The experimental
results indicated that the proposed index was applicable for
detecting oil slicks from different sources in different sea
areas, especially for oil slicks formed by oil exploration and
natural seepage.
Index Terms Landsat 8 OLI, oil slicks, detection
index
1. INTRODUCTION
Oil spills bring disasters to the marine ecosystem but can
provide useful information for offshore oil exploration [1-3].
Thus, it is important to detect floating oil slicks accurately.
According to former studies, synthetic aperture radar (SAR),
multispectral remote sensing, and hyperspectral remote
sensing technologies are effective to detect oil slicks [4-6].
SAR images can identify oil slicks because seawater and the
oil slicks have different backscattering coefficient. Oil slicks
can be monitored in all weather conditions by SAR. But
false alarms, such as planktonic algae, shallow sea areas,
current trajectory, etc. cannot be distinguished from oil
slicks by SAR images. In addition, its detection performance
is affected by wind speed [7]. Hyperspectral remote sensing
images can get the thickness and oil-in-water ratio
information of the oil slicks since they can obtain abundant
spectral information of oil slicks [8]. But the areas covered
by airborne hyperspectral images are limited compared with
SAR and spaceborne multispectral images. When it comes
to multispectral remote sensing images, although their
detection ability is affected by the weather, they can identify
oil slicks more accurately than SAR images and detect more
widely than hyperspectral images. In fact, the detection
ability of these three technologies is complementary.
Since multispectral images are convenient and cheap for
detecting oil slicks, many methods have been proposed
based on multispectral images. In 2012, Eduardo Loos tested
the detection performance of fluorescence index (FI) and
rotation-absorption index (RAI) which highlighted the
fluorescence behavior of oil slicks in MODIS images [9].
The detection results of FI and RAI indicated that they could
be used to locate and map oil slicks interpreting false
positives. In addition, many recent studies stated that
infrared images were effective for oil slick detection since
oil slicks with middle and large thicknesses could reflect
distinct infrared spectral signals compared to seawater [10].
In 2014, Raquel Niclòs proposed that thermal infrared (TIR)
images could be used to detect oil slicks [11]. In 2015,
Qianguo Xing proved that Landsat 8 TIR images could also
be used to detect oil slicks [12]. In 2016, Dominique
Dubucq found that near infrared (NIR) and short wave
infrared (SWIR) images of multispectral data were
competent for oil slick detection [13].
Traditional methods focused on detecting oil slicks in
specific sea areas. Their applicability of detecting oil slicks
from different sources and in different seas was unknown. In
order to detect oil slicks better, this paper proposed an index
named Landsat 8 oil slick detection index (L8OSDI) to
identify oil slicks using Landsat 8 OLI images which had
higher spatial resolution and signal to noise ratio compared
to MODIS, MERIS, and AVHRR images [14]. Three study
areas from different sea areas with oil slicks from different
sources were used to validate the applicability and
superiority of the proposed index. The experimental results
indicated that L8OSDI could detect oil slick accurately
through Landsat 8 multispectral images.
2. STUDY AREA
Three study areas of different seas including Arabian
Gulf, Gulf of Mexico, and sea area near Con Son Islands in
Vietnam (Table 1) were adopted in this research. Arabian Mexico which was rich in oil reserves. There was a stripe of
Gulf was rich in oil and gas resources and there were many oil slicks formed by natural leakage.
oil exploration platforms in this sea area. The oil slicks in The Landsat 8 Level 1 images of the study areas were
study area one (Fig.1 A) were leaked from an exploration downloaded from the official website of USGS. The original
platform. In study area two (Fig.1 B), a strand of oil slicks data contains 12 bands. After FLAASH atmospheric
was left by a ship in the sea near Con Son Islands. Study correction, were
area three (Figure.1 C) was located in the northern Gulf of remained in the reflectance images. The reflectance data was
the legal input data of this research.
Table.1 Study area information
Study area Sensor Sea area Date Time Spatial
(hh: mm: ss, local) resolution (m)
1 Landsat 8/OIL Arabian Gulf 20130826 09:54:23 30
2 Landsat 8/OIL Con Son Islands 20160324 10:08:12 30
3 Landsat 8/OIL Gulf of Mexico 20160423 10:25:50 30

Figure.1 Pictures (A-C) are the true-color composited Landsat 8 images of the study areas (1-3), respectively.

3. METHODS Rgreen
Rnir
L8OSDI (1)
Rgreen Rnir
Rgreen Rnir
xi
xi* 2
x
(2)
( xi x ) / (Nx 1)
(3)
N was the number of samples; x and y were vectors of
normalized L8OSDI values of was the average of
the vector; D was the distance of two vectors.
Thirty seawater and oil slick samples from each study area
Figure.2 Spectral curves of oil slicks and seawater in
were evenly selected to test the detection ability of the two
Landsat 8 image.
strategies. For study area 1-3, the vector distances between
In Landsat 8 images, the spectral curves of oil slicks and
seawater and oil slick for the ratio strategy were 5.02, 6.23,
seawater are similar (Fig.2). Although the spectra of
and 7.18, respectively. However, for normalization strategy,
seawater are slightly higher than that of oil slicks, it is
they were 5.35, 6.29, and 7.29, respectively. In addition, the
difficult to accurately distinguish oil slicks from seawater via
distances between seawater and oil slick samples were
single band. Through sampling and analyzing the spectral
shown in Fig.3. It could be found that, in most cases, the
curves of oil slicks and seawater, it was found that the green
distances of oil slick and seawater samples calculated by the
and near infrared bands of Landsat 8 OLI images could
normalization strategy were greater than those calculated by
ratio strategy. The index abundance map (Fig.4, stretched
(formula 1) were designed to detect oil slicks: ratio and
from 0 to 1) of study area one was consistent with the
normalization. The identification ability of the two strategies
training results. The results meant that the detection ability
was evaluated by the normalized distance (formula 2, 3) of
of the normalization strategy was stronger than the ratio
the vectors of seawater and oil slick samples.
strategy. Thus, the index of normalization strategy was regarded as the L8OSDI in this research.

Figure.3 Distances between seawater and oil slick samples for ratio and normalization strategies.
spectral methods because the waves inspired by ships led to
spectral changes of seawater, which made it difficult to
distinguish oil slicks from ship trajectories. However, the
trajectories of ship were strictly linear and there must be
ships not far from the trajectories. These could be used to
remove false alarms caused by ship trajectories in
multispectral images.

Figure.4 Abundance map of study area one by L8OSDI of

ratio strategy (A) and normalization strategy (B).

4. EXPERIMENTS AND DISCUSSIONS

4.1 Applicability of L8OSDI

The study areas could assess the applicability of L8OSDI

comprehensively. Fig.5 (A, C, E) were the true-color
composited study area 1-3, respectively. Figs.5 (B, D, F)
were the identification results of study area 1-3, respectively.
In Fig.5 A, oil slicks formed by the leakage of the oil
exploration platform were distributed in an
the influence of wind and currents. In Fig.5 B, the detected
oil slicks were obviously brighter than the surrounding
seawater. The stripe of oil slicks could be extracted
completely with sharp edges. In Fig.5 C, oil slicks formed by
ship emission were nearly linearly distributed on the
shipping line. In Fig.5 D, although the identified boundaries
of the oil slicks were unsmooth, the scope of oil slicks could
be extracted clearly from the background. In Fig.5 E, the
shapes of oil slicks formed by nature seepage were feathery.
Because of wind and currents, oil slicks of nature seepage
would converge on one side and spread on the other side. In Figure.5 Oil slick detection results by L8OSDI.
Fig.5 F, the plume natural oil slicks were well distinguished
from the background seawater. The scope of the oil slicks on 4.2 Superiority of L8OSDI
the diffusing side was extracted precisely too. According to
the experimental results, it could be found that the proposed This paper compared the detection performances of
L8OSDI could accurately detect oil slicks caused by leakage L8OSDI with that of FI, RAI, and Landsat 8 SWIR (Fig.6).
of exploration platform, ship emission, and natural seepage In the results, the background of seawater was turned black
in different seas. and oil slicks were extracted as white. Fig.6 (A-D) were the
It should be noticed that the oil slicks were not totally detection results of study area one got by FI, RAI, Landsat 8
differentiated from the trajectories of ships in the results. It SWIR, and L8OSDI, respectively. Fig.6 (E-H) were results
was hard to distinguish oil slicks from ship trajectories by of study area two and Fig.6 (I-L) were results of study area
 three by FI, RAI, Landsat 8 SWIR, and L8OSDI,
respectively. The differences of the detection results were
marked by red boxes in Fig.6.
Figure.6 Extracted oil slicks from the study areas.
According to the former studies, RAI and FI showed good
detection performance in MODIS images, but they could not
accurately detect oil slicks caused by ship emission and
natural seepage in Landsat 8 multispectral images from Fig.6
(E, F, I, J). Landsat 8 SWIR bands had been regarded as an
effective way of detecting oil slicks. The detection results
could prove that conclusion. However, it could be found
from Fig.6 (C, D. K, L) that the results by L8OSDI reserved
more details of oil slicks than Landsat 8 SWIR. Since the oil
slicks formed by natural seepage were relatively thin, the
SWIR signals of seawater and oil slicks were not very
different. Thus, Landsat 8 SWIR got worse detection
performance for study area three than L8OSDI. The contrast
experimental results indicated that L8OSDI was more
suitable for detecting oil slicks formed by oil exploration
and natural seepage in Landsat 8 OLI images.
5. CONCLUSIONS
Basing on the spectral differences of oil slicks and
seawater in green and near infrared bands, this paper
proposed an index named L8OSDI to detect oil slicks using
Landsat 8 images. Three images with oil slicks from
different sources in different sea areas were used to validate
the applicability and superiority of the proposed index. The
experimental results indicated that L8OSDI was suitable for
detecting oil slicks using Landsat 8 multispectral images,
especially for oil slicks formed by oil exploration and
natural seepage. However, it should be announced that
L8OSDI is not applicable to detect oil slicks seriously
polluted by sun glint.
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