A Quantitative Analysis on Different Carbonate Indicators Based on Spaceborne Data in a Controlled Karst Area

Abstract

New sensors aboard recently launched satellites have induced the development of several measures aimed to indicate the presence of many materials over the Earth. Karsts are places rich in carbonate rocks and present large economic and environmental importance. This paper aimed at assessing the performance and consistency of different carbonate estimators derived from orbital images acquired over a controlled karst area. Experiments were assisted by a multi-scaled reference data built through a high spatial resolution Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) image acquired over the selected area. Results show a considerable unconformity among selected measures and better performance presented by indices exploiting measures along visible and infrared spectral regions.