�Remote environmental monitoring and data collection��Iryna Babanina, Dr Anna McKean, CEOBS

Conflict and Environment Observatory��CEOBS is a UK charity working to increase the protection of people and ecosystems from the impact of armed conflicts and military activities�www.ceobs.org, Hebden Bridge, West Yorkshire ��

We work with international organisations, civil society, academia and communities to:�

• Monitor and publicise data on the environmental dimensions of armed conflicts;
• Develop tools to improve data collection and sharing;
• Monitor and scrutinise developments in law and policy that could contribute towards the reduction of humanitarian and environmental harm.
• CEOBS’ overarching aim is to ensure that the environmental consequences of armed conflicts and military activities are properly documented and addressed, and that those affected are assisted.

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Why do we

collect

environmental

data?

��For the next hour…….��

1. Methods for remote data collection and analysis

2a. Social Media Analysis�2b. Satellite image analysis �3. Q/A

Within Ukraine's Borders

Outside Ukraine's Borders

Foam production plant

Kyiv | 3^rd March

Chemical Industry

Rubhizne | 10^th April

Fuel Storage

Odesa | 4^th April

Logistics warehouses

Brovary | 22^nd March

Thermal Power Plant

Okhtyrka | 10^th March

Food Factory

Chernihiv | 23^rd March

Credit: SES of Ukraine

Credit: UkraineNow

Credit: truexanewsua

Credit: Planet Labs

Credit: SES of Ukraine

Credit: Sentinel Hub. Contains modified Copernicus data (2022)

Foam production plant

Kyiv, Location

Chemical Industry

Rubhizne | 10^th April

Fuel Storage

Odesa | 4^th April

Logistics warehouses

Brovary | 22^nd March

Thermal Power Plant

Okhtyrka | 10^th March

Food Factory

Chernihiv | 23^rd March

Credit: © Maxar 2022. Google Earth 2022)

Projects in Ukraine

• Incidents database
• UNEP Ukraine project (training personnel of State Environmental Inspectorate)
• NPA project ‘Protecting the environment in armed conflict in Ukraine’, soil and water sampling in Mykolaiv and Kherson regions
• GROMADA Erasmus+ project ‘European universities supporting legal and community capacities for Ukraine’s environmental recovery’
• OSCE report, briefings

CEOBS incidents database

• Not publicly open (team of 7)
• Incidents peer-reviewed
• User guide, help videos, FAQ’s produced
• Mostly within google suite – some external coding required
• Map of Incidents (25) - https://ceobs.org/ukraine-map/

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Social media information

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-Telegram channels, Twitter aggregator accounts, Facebook, Vkontakte, Linkedin, TikTok etc…

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-From both Ukrainian and Russian sources

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-National level and city or regional level channels

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-Government spokespeople and departments, domestic civil society

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-Twitter - (Миколаїв OR Николаев OR Mykolaiv OR Nikolaev) until:2022-03-15 since:2022-03-14

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-Google Image search, Google lens – Images, video

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- Ministry of Ecology and Natural Resources newsletter

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Facebook

Mapping, Satellite, Street View and Location-Based Information (1)

• Google Maps
• Google Earth Pro
• Yandex
• Satellites Pro
• Big maps
• Open Street Maps
• Wikimapia
• Dual Maps
• Map Carta

Protecting the environment in armed conflict in Ukraine’�Duration: 1st March – 15th May 2024� Implementing partners: Norwegian People’s Aid (NPA) and the Conflict and Environment Observatory (CEOBS)�Donor: Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Conflict and Environment Observatory

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CEOBS is a UK charity working to increase the protection of people and ecosystems from the impact of armed conflicts and military activities.

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Learn more about our work:

www.ceobs.org | @ceobs_org | facebook.com/ceobs | anna@ceobs.org

Using satellite tools to assess war damage to soils

Key satellite observation tools we use

• Planet;
• Sentinel-2;
• Landsat;
• FIRMS

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Satellites for agriculture

• NASA Harvest;
• EUSpace4Ukraine (War impact on Ukrainian Agriculture using Copernicus)

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Key data:

• Explosions;
• Fires;
• Oil spills and water pollution;
• Flooding;
• Pre-visit damage mapping;
• Damage to physically inaccessible locations

Spatial resolution

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Impacts accuracy

of representation of features

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Temporal resolution

The time it takes a satellite to return to the same area.

Spectral resolution

The number of bands collected by a sensor, and amount of the spectrum sampled.

Tracking incident progression

Hubynykha oil depot

Snihurivka oil pumping station

Using Planet Explorer

Planet Explorer is an online tool used to search and analyze geospatial imagery, allowing you to see change across the planet over time.

Planet Explorer includes imagery from Planet’s catalog (PlanetScope, SkySat and RapidEye) as well as public imagery from Sentinel-2 and Landsat 8.

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https://www.planet.com/

https://www.planet.com/markets/education-and-research/

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Select date

Select satellite

Compare images

Link to the session

Measure distance

Map overlays

Hubynykha oil depot, 17 June 2022 - before the strike

Hubynykha oil depot, 19 June 2022 - during the fire

Hubynykha oil depot, 19 June 2022 - smoke extent and direction

Hubynykha oil depot, 27 June 2022 - charred area

Snihurivka oil pumping station, 7 June 2022 - before the strike

Snihurivka oil pumping station, 26 June 2022 - during the fighting

Using Sentinel-2

Sentinel-2 uses multispectral imagery with 13 bands, the combinations of which are used to better understand specific features of the imagery to explore land cover, vegetation health, geological characteristics. Sentinel-2 is amply used for environmental, agriculture, water and forest fire monitoring.

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Snihurivka - on the Sentinel-2 image of 8 June, active fire is visible with a smoke plume of at least 2.3 km

False color image based on bands B8 (visible and near infrared, 842 nm wavelength), B4 (red, 665 nm) and B3 (green, 560 nm) is meant to emphasize healthy and unhealthy vegetation.

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• By using the near-infrared (B8) band, it’s especially good at reflecting chlorophyll. This is why in a color infrared image, denser vegetation is red.

• Built areas appear grey or white. False colors combination also helps identify destroyed buildings - makes the shapes of the structures stand out from the vegetation-covered background.

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• Water appears dark, which helps to identify flooded or waterlogged areas.

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Sentinel-2 – using false color combinations

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Hubynykha oil depot - false colors - 15 June 2022

Hubynykha oil depot - false colors - 20 June 2022

Hubynykha oil depot - false colors - 5 July 2022

Using Sentinel Hub Earth Observation Browser

Using Sentinel Hub Earth Observation Browser

Sentinel-2 – true color imagery

Hubynykha oil depot before, 16 June 2022 – closeup of the affected area

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Sentinel-2 – true color imagery

During, 20 June 2022 – active fire

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Sentinel-2 – true color imagery

After, 5 July 2022 – charred area

Sentinel-2 – using short-wave infrared (SWIR) spectral bands

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The short-wave infrared band combination uses SWIR (B12 band, 2190 nm), NIR (B8A, 865 nm), and red (B4, 665 nm).

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• This composite shows vegetation in various shades of green. In general, darker shades of green indicate denser vegetation.

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• Brown is indicative of bare soil and built-up areas.

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• This combination also highlights active fires and smoldering (thermal anomalies).

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SWIR - before, 15 June 2022

SWIR - during, 20 June 2022

SWIR - after, 5 July 2022

Snihurivka oil pumping station - fire on 6 June 2022

Snihurivka oil pumping station - fire on 6 June 2022 - SWIR

Snihurivka oil pumping station - oil smouldering hotspot, 13 June 2022

Snihurivka oil pumping station - agricultural land fires, 3 July 2022

Snihurivka oil pumping station - agricultural land fires, 3 July 2022

Sentinel-2 – using NDVI (Normalized Difference Vegetation Index)

NDVI uses near-infrared (which vegetation strongly reflects) and red light (which vegetation absorbs), to assess the health of vegetation.

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Chlorophyll (a health indicator pigment) strongly absorbs visible light.

The cellular structure of the leaves strongly reflects near-infrared light.

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When the plant becomes dehydrated, sick, afflicted with disease, etc., the spongy layer deteriorates, and the plant absorbs more of the near-infrared light, rather than reflecting it. Thus, observing how NIR changes compared to red light provides an accurate indication of the presence of chlorophyll, which correlates with plant health.

Using Sentinel-2 to detect flooding and waterlogging

Hola Prystan city before Kakhovka Dam breach – 3 June 2023 – false colours

Hola Prystan city after Kakhovka Dam breach – 8 June 2023 – false colours highlight flooded and waterlogged areas

Hola Prystan city after Kakhovka Dam breach, many areas are still flooded/waterlogged, false colours – 02 August 2023

Karlivka dam destruction – 12 April 2024

Karlivka dam destruction, false colours – 12 April 2024

Using FIRMS – Fire Information for Resource Management System

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The Fire Information for Resource Management System (FIRMS) distributes near-realtime active fire data from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) aboard the Aqua and Terra satellites, and the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) aboard S-NPP and NOAA 20. Globally these data are available within 3 hours of satellite observation, but for the US and Canada active fire detections are available in real-time.

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Fire Map:

https://firms.modaps.eosdis.nasa.gov/map

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Fire Map mirror website:

https://firms2.modaps.eosdis.nasa.gov/map

Using FIRMS – Fire Information for Resource Management System

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Modes:

• Basic mode – daily information
• Advanced mode – updated every few hours

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Layers:

• The Coastlines/Borders/Roads layer is a reference layer that displays global coastlines, country borders, first order administrative boundaries and major roads.
• Human Built-up And Settlement Extent layer is from the Global Human Built-up And Settlement Extent (HBASE) Dataset from Landsat.
• Protected Areas and European Regional PAs - these layers are from the World Database on Protected Areas (WDPA) (August 2023), the most comprehensive global database of marine and terrestrial protected areas.

Hubynykha oil refinery fire - FIRMS data on 18 June 2022

Hubynykha oil refinery fire - FIRMS data on 19 June 2022

Hubynykha oil refinery fire - FIRMS data on 20 June 2022

Esri Imagery

Esri develops geographic information systems (GIS) solutions that function as an integral component in nearly every type of organization. On any given day, millions of people worldwide use Esri's ArcGIS to improve the way their organizations conduct business.

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World Imagery Wayback App

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Hubynykha oil depot - 10 August 2022

Snihurivka station - 23 August 2022

Damaged irrigation canals of Inhulets system and Russian trenches - 23 August 2022

Thank you!