Applications and Analyses of Satellite-borne L-band Synthetic Aperture Radar Data in Coastal Environments

There is rapid population growth in coastal environments. Development and competing demands for resources and natural hazards offer an additional threat to coastal communities. Remote sensing provides a means of monitoring the intra- and inter-annual variability both natural and human impacts cause. In this article, we review the application of satellite-borne Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) to the coastal zone and provide two examples, seasonal inundation mapping on coastal floodplains at the regional scale in eastern North Carolina, USA, and shoreline delineation and change in estuary of Pamlico Peninsula, Dare County, North Carolina. The results SAR data provide are reliable and repeatable, and can potentially be used to identify critical areas in coastal environments where there is a need to respond to the pressures caused by population growth, land use and land cover change, natural hazards and sea level rise that may be brought about by global climate change

Cartography · Climate change · Environmental resource management · Estuary · Floodplain · Geography · Land cover · Land use · Meteorology · Natural hazard · Peninsula · Physical geography · Population · Remote sensing · Shore · Synthetic aperture radar · Arctic and Antarctic ice dynamics · Coastal and Marine Dynamics · Environmental Science · Tropical and Extratropical Cyclones Research · Ecology · Geology · Oceanography