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Environmental impact analysis of quarrying activities established on and near

a river bed by using remotely sensed data

Article  in  Fresenius Environmental Bulletin · November 2012

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Orkan Ozcan Nebiye Musaoglu

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© by PSP Volume 21 – No 11. 2012 Fresenius Environmental Bulletin

ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT ANALYSIS OF

QUARRYING ACTIVITIES ESTABLISHED ON AND
NEAR A RIVER BED BY USING REMOTELY SENSED DATA

Orkan Ozcan1,*, Nebiye Musaoglu2 and Dursun Zafer Seker2

1
ITU, Center for Satellite Communication and Remote Sensing, 34469 Maslak, Istanbul/ Turkey
2
ITU, Faculty of Civil Engineering, Department of Geomatics Engineering, 34469 Maslak, Istanbul/Turkey

ABSTRACT KEYWORDS:
Quarrying, time-Series, shoreline erosion, change detection

Several serious environmental impacts related to quar-

rying activities on and near the river, such as vibrations,
land degradation, land subsidence and landslides, water
pollution, occupational noise pollution, and air pollution, will 1 INTRODUCTION
lead to health-related problems and loss of biodiversity.
Environmental changes caused by mankind’s exploi-
Quarrying operations can adversely alter pre-existing tation, and development of natural water and soil re-
ecosystems, and change hydrogeological and hydrological sources have long been a severe problem in the world [1].
regimes. This adverse influence of stone and sand quarry-
ing induces damage in property, depletion of ground wa- Quarrying activities have an important influence to
ter, loss of fertile topsoil, degradation of forests, deterioration ecological environment [2]. They have had a series of
in aquatic biodiversity and public health. On the other hand, serious environmental-geological problems to the socio-
haphazard quarrying of sand from riverbeds may cause a economic development and urban modernization process,
rapid change in bed configuration in response to the such as increased environmental pollution, soil erosion,
changes in flow. destruction of landscape aesthetics, patterns and integrity,
groundwater seepage fluctuations and consequent natural
Quarrying basically destroys landscape. This can lead habitat-induced geological disasters [3, 4].
to downstream movement, scouring, or accumulation of
sediment while provoking shoreline erosion. When riverbeds Baraldi and others [5] observed that the main envi-
are composed of sand, this on-going pattern of erosion and ronmental modifications caused by quarries were creation
deposition causes meanders to progress slowly downstream of regular-shaped depressions, minor isolated artificial
in time. relief, creation of artificial ponds, partial or total destruction
of fluvial terraces, erosion and instability of quarry scarps,
In this study; change detection and environmental im- depression of piezometric surface, alteration of groundwater
pacts due to stone and sand quarrying activities in the wa- flow direction, formation of periodically flooded areas, per-
tershed area have been determined and evaluated using manent removal of areas from farming use, alteration of
multi temporal Landsat 5 TM satellite images that were farming practices, and changes to the pedological character-
verified with ground truth data. These time series data on istics of soil.
the extent of land in eco-sensitive areas were examined to
assess the impact on environment. At the end of the study, The discharge of freshwater and sediment from rivers
thematic maps of the affected areas were created by using into the seas has been drastically reduced over the last few
appropriate visualization and classification techniques in decades as a result of damming and agricultural irrigation
conjunction with geographical information system. [6], leading to coastal erosion. Erosion and sedimentation
are natural processes, but often are in conflict with the use
Consequently, the changes on the mouth of the river of the shoreline.
were investigated by the impact analyses of quarrying
activities established on and near upstream of the riverbed. The most noticeable problem created by erosion is the
Owing to this, a considerable extension in the shoreline loss of waterfront property. Human activities along shore-
around 400 m was observed on the river mouth in the study lines and throughout watersheds can bring about changes
area. that greatly accelerate the natural erosional process, often
with profound environmental or economic impacts. Mor-
ton [7] showed that natural processes and human activities
* Corresponding author were responsible for shoreline changes.

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There are several reasons that decrease the sediment and near the river bed, (2) its environmental impact analy-
load brought by rivers to the coast. The most important of sis on shoreline, (3) mapping the regeneration/ regrowth
these are the construction of dams and engineering works of quarrying areas, and (4) tracing major changes in land
along the rivers. Dams intercept almost all the sediment cover. Furthermore, the application of Geographical In-
brought from upstream sections. formation System (GIS) in analyzing the trends and esti-
Furthermore, by modifying the water discharge to mating the changes that have occurred in different themes
make it more uniform, the sediment transport downstream helps in management decision-making processes.
of a dam is altered while reducing its efficiency. Previous Digital spatial data analysis and mapping; remote
studies have revealed impacts including: erosion of the sensing and GIS are widely applied in environmental and
delta coastline related mainly to water and sediment ab- natural resources monitoring [16, 17].
straction by damming [8]. This study is carried out in order to assess the land
In addition to damming of rivers, alterations of the cover/ use change on upstream and downstream sections of
flow regimes by diversions, engineering works, modifica- the Sakarya River by means of multi-temporal satellite
tion of the discharge rates and patters are also responsible images via monitoring the variations in the shoreline due to
for the decreased sediment loads brought to the coast, and quarrying activities and its impacts on environment. The
thus for coastal erosion. Another major cause for decreased used method depends on the comparative analysis of inde-
sediment input to the coast and the consequent erosion is pendently classified four Landsat 5 TM images in GIS en-
sand and gravel quarries located along the active riverbeds. vironment for both upstream and downstream section.
This activity is usually not allowed from the coast, but sig-
nificance of mining from riverbeds is often overlooked [9].
Shorelines shrink in size when manmade features like 2 MATERIALS AND METHODS
dams and quarrying activities have been established on
and along rivers, or other bodies of water that stop new The Sakarya Basin is the twelfth of the twenty-six main
sand from naturally nourishing the sea coast. According basins located in Turkey. The Sakarya River is 510 km in
to Berger and Iams [10] geo-indicators such as shoreline total length and 60 - 150 m in width, with a drainage area of
position can be used to assess environmental changes and 58 160 km2 addressing to 7.5 % overall surface area of
measure the integrity, stability and sustainability of the Turkey [18]. Both the main branch of the Sakarya River
biological and physical environment. and the secondary branches and small rivers on the basin
have a significant amount of sediment transport potential.
Remote sensing (RS) is one of the most preferred and
reliable methods in monitoring and managing environment The study area was investigated concerning two re-
and resources [11, 12]. Remote sensing data can be used in gions. The first region of the selected study area encloses
environmental monitoring programs where the objective is the area where quarrying activities established on and near
to monitor changes in surface phenomena over time [13]. the upstream part of the Sakarya River. Bilecik is a prov-
RS technology in recent years has proved to be of ince in Midwest Turkey at which most of the sand and
great importance in acquiring data for effective resources stone quarrying operations are especially located. The
management and, hence, could be applied to coastal envi- second region is the downstream one of the Sakarya
ronment monitoring and management [14]. River where shoreline changes have occurred, especially
after 1999 (Fig. 1).
Based on remote sensing, a variety of data pertaining
to the coastal zone, such as shoreline changes, can be Karasu is situated in the western Black Sea coast hav-
monitored and relevant observations can be made that will ing nearly 20 km coastline and located at the downstream
help in the management of effective coastal ecosystem. region of the Sakarya River. It has an over winter popula-
tion of around 54 000 that swells substantially in the sum-
Monitoring and controlling these changes have been mer to around 250 000 due to the increase in tourist inflow.
difficult due to exorbitant expenses and lengthy time peri-
ods in producing reliable and up-to-date mapping. Besides, Regarding the consecutively settled dams (Gokcekaya,
a successful monitoring approach for evaluating surface Sariyar and Yenice Dam) on the main branch of Sakarya
quarrying processes and their dynamics at a regional scale River at which suspended sediments are held on the up-
requires observations with frequent temporal coverage over stream, the annual sediment transport reaches very sig-
a long period of time to differentiate natural changes from nificant amounts to the downstream [19].
those associated with human activities [15]. While the quarrying activities on and near the Sakarya
On the other hand, visualization of the processed re- River were accounted to be 9% of the entire sector of Tur-
motely sensed data by using effective tools and techniques key in 1996, this rate has increased to 18% in 2004 [20].
provides significant benefits for the users from different The study region includes the province of Adapazari,
environmental sciences. which has earthquake-induced residential areas, as well as
For detection of land use/cover change, multi tempo- industrial and fertile agricultural lands. The North Anato-
ral data of Landsat 5 TM were found to be more suitable lia Fault Zone (NAFZ), which is still active, is also pass-
for: (1) the identification of quarrying areas established on ing through this area [21].

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FIGURE 1 - The study area.

2.1 Data and methodology a depth of 17 km and caused right-lateral strike-slip

RS data from Landsat 5 TM system was utilized to movement on the fault. Several thousand buildings col-
assess quarrying areas’ thermal characteristics in Sakarya lapsed and 17 480 people lost their lives, and nearly
watershed of Turkey. 50 000 people injured in Istanbul, Kocaeli and Sakarya
provinces [22].
Landsat 5 TM has been imaging the Earth since
March 1984. The TM sensor has a spatial resolution of 30 The quarrying activities increased on and near the
m for bands 1 - 5 and band 7, and has a spatial resolution riverbed after the earthquake due to the preference of
of 120 m for band 6. river sand instead of sea sand for the construction of new
buildings in the process of re-structuring.
For the analysis of quarrying activities established on
and near the riverbed, thermal band of Landsat 5 TM The designated areas of the quarrying activities are
imagery was added to the band combination to discrimi- shown in Table 1.
nate the residential and quarrying areas.
TABLE 1 – The statistical results of quarrying activities.
The time series of Landsat 5 TM images were used to
Change in area Total Change
investigate surface thermal patterns of the areas where the Year Area (ha)
(ha)
Change (%)
(%)
volume of stone and sand quarrying activities have been 1999 379
179 47.23
increased in the period of 1984 to 2010 (Fig. 2). 2003 558 116.89
The areas of quarries in 1984, 1999, 2003 and 2010 264 47.31
2010 822
were calculated, and the size and direction of expansion
was determined by performing GIS analysis.
Time series analysis has shown that the volume of
On 17 August 1999, an earthquake of magnitude 7.4 quarrying activities significantly increased after the earth-
shook northwestern Turkey. The earthquake originated at quake in August 1999.

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1984 1999

2003 2010

FIGURE 2 - Analysis of quarrying activities from 1984 to 2010 using multi temporal Landsat 5 TM Satellite Images.

In order to determine the land use/cover and spatial 3 RESULTS

changes, ISODATA unsupervised classification method has
been used for the classification of the satellite images [23]. As the result of the study, the impact analyses of
The environmental geo-indicators that were considered in quarrying activities established on and near upstream
qualitative and quantitative ways were derived using RS section of the riverbed were determined, and changes on
data. the mouth of the river were investigated.

Coastal lines belonging to the years of 1984, 2003 and The Landsat 5 TM image acquired on 1984 was used
2010 were extracted and classified as a separate study to as a reference for the measurements of the shoreline
display the differences occurring at the study area (Fig 3). changes in 1999, 2003 and 2010 (Fig. 4).

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In order to determine the changes in the shoreline, 10 Especially, a coastline erosion of about 400 m was
cross-sections have been taken from near river mouth for observed on 5th and 6th cross-sections while showing a
the periods of 1984 –2010. decrease away from the riverbed (Fig. 5).
Graphical representation of coastline changes be-
tween the years of 1999, 2003 and 2010 shows that there
were considerable changes on and near the river mouth.

1984 1999

2003 2010

FIGURE 3 – Classification results of the changes on the coastline affected from quarrying activities in time.

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FIGURE 4 - Cross-sections on reference Landsat 5 TM image acquired in 1984.

FIGURE 5 – Coastline change observations on the cross-sections.

4 CONCLUSION Coastal ecosystems are of great importance, and of

immense value to mankind in the present and in the fu-
It is clearly seen that the lack of proper coastal and riv- ture. They are being degraded at an alarming rate by vari-
er basin management triggers coastal erosion. Several of ous preventable activities including that of human inter-
the causes are due to human activities and developments ference. The coastal ecosystems are to be monitored peri-
that take place far away from the coastline (building of odically for better management plans. The satellite-based
dams, flow diversions, afforestation works, sand and sensors provide valuable information useful in assess-
gravel mining from river beds). ment, monitoring and management of coastal ecosystems.
The damming of rivers and sand quarrying over rivers The information, thus derived, can be very useful in
that reduce the amount of freshwater and sandy sediment the quarrying impact determination, environmental and
being discharged at the coast, contributes to the degrada- coastal ecosystem management, which is greatly required
tion of coastal wetlands and coastal erosion. for the sustainable use, development, and protection of the

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