Soil Erosion Assessment Using Remotely Sensed Data and Ancillary Data in the Desert Of ...

82 Pages·2003·6.62 MB·English

Soil Erosion Assessment Using
Remotely Sensed Data and Ancillary
Data in the Desert Of Tabernas,
southeast Spain
YaredJilloGobena
,2003

Soil Erosion Assessment Using Remotely Sensed Data and
Ancillary Data in the Desert Of Tabernas, southeast Spain
by
YaredJilloGobena
ThesissubmittedtotheInternationalInstituteforGeo-informationScienceandEarthObservationin
partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree in Master of Science in Geo-information Science
andEarthObservation,EnvironmentalSystemAnalysisandMonitoringspecialization.
DegreeAssessmentBoard
Thesisadvisor Dr. TsehaieWoldai
prof. Dr. FreekvanderMeer
Thesisexaminers prof. Dr. FreekvanderMeer(Chairman)
Dr. K.HeinUU(ExternalExaminer)
Dr. Dr. D.P.Shrestha(Member)
Dr. P.M.vanDijk(PD)(Observer)
INTERNATIONAL INSTITUTE FOR GEO-INFORMATION SCIENCE AND EARTH OBSERVATION
ENSCHEDE, THE NETHERLANDS
Disclaimer
This document describes work undertaken as part of a programme of study at the International
InstituteforGeo-informationScienceandEarthObservation(ITC).Allviewsandopinionsexpressed
therein remain the sole responsibility of the author, and do not necessarily represent those of the
institute.
Contents
ListofFigures iii
ListofTables v
Acknowledgements vii
Abstract ix
1 INTRODUCTION 1
1.1 ENVIRONMENTALPROBLEMSINTHESTUDYAREA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
1.2 PREVIOUSACTIVITIES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
1.3 RESEARCHOBJECTIVES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
1.4 IMPORTANCEOFTHERESEARCH . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
1.5 METHODOLOGY. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
1.6 RESEARCHMOTIVATIONS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
1.7 HYPOTHESIS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
1.8 RESEARCHOUTLINE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
2 DESCRIPTIONOFTHESTUDYAREA 9
2.1 LOCATIONSANDACCESS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
2.2 CLIMATE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
2.3 GEOMORPHOLOGY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
2.4 SOILS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
2.5 LANDCOVER . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
2.5.1 CHANGESINLANDCOVER . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
2.6 LANDUSE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
2.6.1 CHANGESINLANDUSE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
2.7 GEOLOGICPROCESSESANDLANDDEGRADATION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
2.8 INFRASTRUCTUREDEVELOPMENT(ROAD) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
3 GEOLOGYANDSTRUCTURE 17
3.1 METAMORPHICRROCKSOFTHEBETICZONE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
3.2 NEVADO-FILABRIDECOMPLEX . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
3.3 ALPUJARRIDECOMPLEX . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
3.4 MALAGUIDECOMPLEX . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
3.5 SEDIMENTARYSUCCESSION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
3.6 QUATERNARYDEPOSITS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
i
Contents
3.7 GEOLOGYANDENVIRONMENT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
4 MATERIAL,RESEARCHMETHODSANDTECHNIQUES 23
4.1 INTRODUCTION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
4.2 MATERIALS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
4.3 METHODOLOGY. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
4.4 DATAANALYSIS,IMAGEPROCESSINGANDINTERPRETATIONOFREMOTESENS-
INGANDGISDATA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
4.4.1 DATAANALYSIS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
4.4.2 IMAGEDATAHANDLING. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
4.4.3 SPATIALDATAANALYSIS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
4.4.4 COLOURCOMPOSITE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
4.4.5 NORMALIZEDDIFFERENCEVEGETATIONINDEX(NDVI) . . . . . . . . . 26
4.5 CONCLUSIONS. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
5 SOILEROSION(SOILLOSS)ASSESSMENT 29
5.1 INTRODUCTION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
5.1.1 SHEETEROSION. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
5.1.2 GULLYEROSION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
5.2 CLASSIFICATION OF PHYSIOGRAPHIC ZONES FOR SEDIMENT GENERATION
ANDDEPOSITION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
5.3 PREDICTIONOFSOILEROSIONBYWATERUSINGRUSLE . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
5.3.1 RAINFALL-RUNOFFEROSIVITYFACTOR(R) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
5.3.2 SOILERODIBILTYFACTOR(K) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
5.3.3 SLOPELENGTHANDSLOPESTEEPNESSFACTORS(LS) . . . . . . . . . . 40
5.3.4 COVER-MANAGEMENTFACTOR(C) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
5.3.5 CONSERVATIONPRACTICEFACTOR(P) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
5.3.6 SOILLOSS(A) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
5.4 CONCLUSIONS. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
6 RESULTSANALYSISANDDISCUSSION 49
6.1 INTRODUCTION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
6.2 RAINFALL-RUNOFFEROSIVITYFACTOR(K) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
6.3 SOILERODIBILITYFACTOR(K) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51
6.4 SLOPELENGTHANDSLOPESTEEPNESSFACTOR(LS) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
6.5 COVER-MANAGEMENTFACTOR(C) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
6.6 SENSITIVITYANALYSIS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
7 CONCLUSIONSANDRECOMMENDATIONS 57
7.1 CONCLUSIONS. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
7.2 RECOMMENDATIONS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58
References 59
8 APPENDICES 63
ii
List of Figures
1.1 OperationalFlowChart. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
2.1 LocationmapoftheTabernasBasin(thestudyarea). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
2.2 MonthlyPrecipitation,potentialevapotranspirationandtemperatureinTabernasarea. 11
2.3 BadlandsgeomorphologyoftheTabernasarea[20]. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
3.1 GeologicalSettingoftheBeticCordilleras[63]. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
3.2 Graphitemicaschist(light-dark)andTahalschist(light-brown)(GRMEG,2002). . . 19
3.3 Turbiditicsandstoneandmarloverlainunconformablybyconglomerate(ChozasFro-
mation). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
3.4 Geologicalmapofstudyarea(GRMEG,2002). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
4.1 False colour composites (vegetation: Reddish; bareland: DimGray and Grey and wa-
ter: Bluish). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
4.2 MapofNDVI. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
4.3 MapofNDVIClassified. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
5.1 Uplifted and faulted Miocene marls (Chozas Formation) are being eroded by surface
processes,leadingtotheformationofgullyandvalleys(Mitchell,1995). . . . . . . . 30
5.2 MapofDEMofstudyarea. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
5.3 Mapofphysiographiczones. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
5.4 GeneralFlowChartofRUSLE. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
5.5 Texturalclassesforsoilerodibilityprediction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
5.6 Mapofcategoriesofsoilvulnerabilitytoerosionanddepositionareas. . . . . . . . . 38
5.7 Estimated soil erodibility factor (K) by the equation of Wischmeier soil-erodibility
nomograph,andKin[ton/haperMJ/ha*mm/yr].. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
5.8 Estimated soil erodibility factor (K) by mean geometric particle size (world soil data
set)methodandKin[ton/haperMJ/ha*mm/hr]. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
5.9 Mapoferosionriskcategories. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
5.10 MapofLSfactorwithvaluerangesfrom0.128-12.248. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
5.11 Tableoflandcoverclasses. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
5.12 Table of annual soil loss (A) for soil with organic matter and dots indicate that the
continuationofvaluesforeachgridcells. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
5.13 Tableofannualsoilloss(A)forsoilwithoutorganicmatteranddotsindicatethatthe
continuationofvaluesforeachgridcells. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
5.14 Map of annual soil loss (A1) for soil sample with organic matter and values vary for
eachgridcellsrangingfrom0.15-14.55ton/gridcells. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
iii
ListofFigures
5.15 Map of annual soil loss (A2) for soil sample without organic matter and values vary
foreachgridcellsrangingfrom0.41-38.81ton/gridcells. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
6.1 Tableoftypicalannualerosivityrangeclassificationindifferentunitsystems[15] . . 50
6.2 Graph of monthly rainfall amounts and associated sum of square of monthly rainfall
perannualrainfall . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51
6.3 Graph of soil erodibility as a function of mean geometric particle diameter (Dg) in
S.I.unitsor(ton/haperMJ/ha*mm/hr) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
6.4 GraphofSlopelengthfactor(L)andSlopesteepnessfactor(S)vsSoillosss(A) . . . 54
6.5 GraphsofSlopefactors(LS)andSlope%(SLOPEPCT)vssoilloss(A) . . . . . . . . 55
6.6 GraphofRainfallerosivityfactor(R)vsSoilloss(A) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
6.7 GraphofSoilerodibilityfactor(K)vssoilloss(A) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56
6.8 GraphofCovermanagementfactor(C)vsSoilloss(A) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56
8.1 MapofdegradedandbadlandgeomorphologyinTabernasarea . . . . . . . . . . . 63
8.2 TableofRainfallandTemperaturedataforAlmeriaareafromSpanishMeteorological
Office(1968-1990). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64
8.3 Exampleofequationofmeangeometricparticlediameter(worddataset) . . . . . . . 65
8.4 Tableofsoiltexturedata(Tilahun,2002) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
8.5 Tableofcoordinatesystemandsamplenumberforsoiltexturedata(Tilahun,2002) . 66
8.6 TableofILWIS3.0RUSLETopographicFactor(LS)interfaceforsoillossestimatedper
gridcellsthatcontinuedfromchapter5and; K1andA1indicatesvaluesforsoilwith
organicmatterwhileK2andA2indicatesvaluesforsoilwithoutorganicmatter . . 66
8.7 TableofILWIS3.0RUSLETopographicFactor(LS)interfaceforsoillossestimatedper
gridcellscontinued. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
8.8 TableofILWIS3.0RUSLETopographicFactor(LS)interfaceforsoillossestimatedper
gridcellscontinued. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
8.9 TableofILWIS3.0RUSLETopographicFactor(LS)interfaceforsoillossestimatedper
gridcellscontinued. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68
8.10 TableofILWIS3.0RUSLETopographicFactor(LS)interfaceforsoillossestimatedper
gridcellscontinued. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68
iv
List of Tables
5.1 EstimatedAnnualRainfallErosivityFactor(R)(MJ/ha.mm/hr.) . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
5.2 Sizelimitsofsoiltextureclassification(worldsoildataset) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
5.3 Thenumberofgridcells(NPix)andtheirrespectiveareascalculatedfromTopographic
factor(LS)interfacebyILWISRUSLE3.0andtheirerosionriskcategories . . . . . . 42
v
ListofTables
vi