A Catchment Scale Geomorphological Change Monitoring and Warning System for Large Rivers in Southeast Asia
Abstract
The Ayeyarwady River which cut across Myanmar through its entire length of 2,170 km in north-south direction is the lifeline of country influencing every stratum of the society. The drastic changes in water levels coupled with sediment loads due to the monsoon system and flooding impart dynamic changes in river morphology every year. Morphological change is evidenced along three fourth of the river length including its two major tributaries Chindwin and upper Ayeyarwady, and it is a major concern due to the risk to stability of villages, infrastructure, farmlands and navigation route. To support operational planning of Directorate of Water resources and River Improvement (DWIR) of Myanmar, we developed a web-based prototype catchment scale river morphological change monitoring and warning system using Landsat imagery in Google Earth Engine (GEE) from 1985 to 2017 for entire lower Ayeyarwady and significant sections of Chindwin and upper Ayeyarwardy river. Through variations in annual channel masks, changes in depths, channel widths, accretion and erosion locations were quantified. Morphological induced variations in stream center-line was mapped from annual channel masks to delineate the course of river amenable for navigation purposes. In addition, river sections were clustered into different risk categories based on the observed multi-decade changes in dynamic of river morphology to aid DWIR to assess the effect of various river improvement and stabilization activities. Villages, urban centers and agricultural areas which were affected due to past changes in channel morphology were mapped. Efforts are currently underway to utilize Sentinel-1 and 2 images along with Landsat-8 to enhance the operational capability of the proposed monitoring system at the end of each monsoon season. By fusing processed channel masks from multitude of satellite platforms, this system will provide seasonal information of channel platform changes to the decision makers in DWIR to plan river training and bank protection activities. The system is applicable to track river morphological changes and identify areas at risk in other large rivers in South and Southeast Asia such as Mekong River and Ganges River.
- Publication:
-
AGU Fall Meeting Abstracts
- Pub Date:
- December 2018
- Bibcode:
- 2018AGUFMGC31K1380M
- Keywords:
-
- 1622 Earth system modeling;
- GLOBAL CHANGEDE: 1630 Impacts of global change;
- GLOBAL CHANGEDE: 1632 Land cover change;
- GLOBAL CHANGEDE: 1640 Remote sensing;
- GLOBAL CHANGE