Recent Articles-IJGGS

Land use and Land cover change detection through Remote Sensing & GIS Technology: Case study of Pathankot and Dhar Kalan Tehsils, Punjab

Author(s)– Prabhbir Singh, Kamlesh Khanduri

ABSTRACT
The objective of study is to prepare land use/land cover map for different time periods, analyse the land use changes and evaluate the socio – economic implications of predicted change. Landuse changes have been detected by image processing method in EDRAS imagine9.3, ArcGIS9.3. Monitoring of landuse/landcover changes help to plan development activities such as major schemes and for community requirements. Fifteen year time period of 1991 -2006 shows some major land use changes.  During this period of fifteen years 104.02 sqkm areas has undergone positive changes into Cropped Land and Builtup areas from Forest and Fallow land.  There is a remarkable increase (69.23sq/km) in the area of Crop Land.

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Recent Articles-IJGGS

Time sequential surface change analysis of Talcher-Angul region of Orissa using Remote Sensing  and GIS

Author(s)– Shweta Panwar, Rakesh Kumar Sinha, Gurdeep Singh

ABSTRACT
Angul-Talcher has been emerging as a major industrial centre with intense and large scale coal mining activities. As a consequence, this has been declared as a critically polluted area particularly due to severe land degradation. Land use pattern of Angul Talcher has undergone several changes over the years. Surface and sub surface mining and industrial activities have resulted in considerable changes in the land use pattern. An attempt has been made to study the time series surface changes in Land Use and Land Cover in Talcher-Angul region for the years 1973, 2007 and 2011 covering an area of 5028 sq.kms. Different interpretation techniques such as unsupervised classification, digitization and visual interpretation were used on the satellite image, toposheet and Google Earth image respectively. An immense increment of 22.58% can be seen in wasteland and decrement of 26.44 % in agriculture over a period of 38 years. During 1973 and 2007, major changes took place in wasteland and agriculture however between 2007 and 2011, the forest was the most affected entity with a decrease of 1.4%. This study emphasises the need to hold the agricultural lands and forests from the growing mining and industrial interference.

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Recent Articles-IJGGS

Stream dynamics change analysis using Remote Sensing and GIS techniques

Author(s)– Suryavanshi Shakti et.al.,

ABSTRACT
In the present investigation, an effort has been made to study the stream dynamics of the Chambal River using Remote Sensing and Geographical Information System techniques. To determine the changes in flow dynamics, meandering and Entrenchment Ratio (ER) of the Chambal river satellite data of MSS (1972), TM (1990) and ETM+ (2000) has been used. In this study, the bankfull width of the river was obtained by digitizing the MSS, TM and ETM+ satellite imaginaries. The central flow lines of the river in all three years were digitized and compared to find out flow dynamics, meandering and Entrenchment Ratio (ER). The origin of the river was considered from the Rana Pratap Sagar dam. The river dynamics changes at forest land, ravineous land and the places where it joins river Yamuna. The river Chambal has been found to be meander continuously towards the right during past 28 years at a distance of 140 km away from the origin. The maximum and minimum width of the river Chambal was found to be 1698 and 227.23 m at a distance of 300 and 150 km respectively. The maximum ER was found to be 3.5 at a distance of 350 km away from the origin. The study revealed that RS and GIS techniques are useful to find out the stream dynamics of the river.

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Recent Articles-IJGGS

A review on biomass estimation methods using synthetic aperture radar data

Author(s)– Nafiseh Ghasemi et.al.,

ABSTRACT
Due to the important role of forests in the global carbon cycle, it’s necessary to pay more attention to these regions. Among forests biophysical parameters, Biomass estimation as the most influencing factor on the ecosystem is the most important. Due to limitations of traditional forest inventory technique to measure biomass, remote sensing has been widely used for biomass estimation in the past decade. In areas with complex structure, various species and multilayer vegetation cover, using microwave images would be the only solution because of the limitation of optical images. According to recent studies about biomass estimation with microwave images, the interferometry technique yields the best results but still is limited and not tested in all forest types. Because using microwave images has its own problems, focusing on the development of the new approaches which can handle multi source data, identify and decrease uncertainty sources in biomass estimation is required in future studies.

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Recent Articles-IJES

Ground water recharge zonation mapping and modeling using Geomatics techniques
Author(s)-  Binay Kumar, Uday Kumar

ABSTRACT

ABSTRACT

Availability of groundwater varies spatially and temporally depending upon the terrain. The scarcity of water affects the environmental and developmental activities of an area. Continuous failure of monsoon, increasing demand and over exploitation leads to depletion of ground-water level. This problem could be sorted out to certain extent by artificially recharging the potential aquifers. Construction of small water harvesting structures across streams/watersheds is gaining momentum in recent years. In the present study, potential sites for construction of rainwater harvesting structures in the Lower Sanjai Watershed of Kolhan Division of Jharkhand have been identified using remote sensing and GIS techniques. Since the study area comprises of hard rocky basement of Precambrians/Archaeans, the intersection zones of lineaments provides potential avenues for ground water accumulation and ground water recharge.

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Recent Articles-IJGGS

Morphometric analysis of Nanjangud taluk, Mysore District, Karnataka, India, using GIS Techniques

Author(s)– Mahadevaswamy.G et.al.,

ABSTRACT
An attempt has been made to study drainage morphometry and its influence on hydrology of Nanjanagud taluk.For detailed study data for preparing DEM, aspect grid and slope maps. Geographic information system was used in evaluation of linear, areal and relief aspects of morphometric parameters. The study reveals that the elongated shape of area is mainly due to guiding effect of thrusting and faulting. In all forty one sub- basin in Nanjangud taluk have been selected for the study. Quantitative morphometric analysis has been carried out for linear, relief, and aerial aspects for all the sub-basin. The streams up to fourth order can be seen in all the sub-basin.  The morphometric analysis reveals that Hullahalli sub-basin show lower value of drainage density, stream frequency, elongation ratio, relief ratio, infiltration number indicating highly permeable sub-soil materials under dense vegetation cover.  Except Hullahalli sub-basin all the other sub-basin showing fractured, resistant, permeable rocks and drainage network seems to be not affected by tectonic disturbances.

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Recent Articles-IJGGS

A study on the Land use pattern change along the coastal region of Nagapattinam, Tamil Nadu

Author(s)– Arunachalam S et.al.,

ABSTRACT
The ground water in a particular coastal aquifer is to be described, evaluated and explained primarily by application of principles of aquatic chemistry to hydrogeological systems to understand the migration of solutes using field data. The origin of salinity is not only due to seawater intrusion but there are other possible sources. There is a lot of human pressure on the coast line due to urbanization, industrialisation, aquacultural and agricultural activities. Apart from these factors, salinity increase in the coastal aquifers, sea level changes, changes in coastal configurations due to mining activities and impact of the natural calamities like floods, tsunami and earth quake also add to the magnitude of the problem. This study aims to bring out the Land use/land cover pattern of study area were studied using IRS P6 LISS III data and correlate with the water level, Electrical conductivity of ground water and rainfall variations. Two data products were selected during May 2000 and august 2009 to study the land use pattern variations. The land use/land cover patterns were visually interpreted and digitized using ERDAS IMAGINE, MapInfo and Arc GIS software. The study reveals that the agricultural area has increased by 172sq.km and settlements by 28.5 sq. km there is a decrease in water bodies and others (includes waste land).

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Recent Articles-IJGGS

Climate Change accelerating hydrological hazards and risks in Himalaya: A case study through remote sensing and GIS modeling

Author(s)– Pradeep K. Rawat,Tiwari.P.C,Charu C.Pant

ABSTRACT
The main objective of the study was to assess the impact of climate change on hydrological hazards through integrated Database Management System (DMS) on three GIS modules i.e. climate informatics and land use-informatics and hydro-informatics. The Dabka watershed constitutes a part of the Kosi Basin in the Lesser Himalaya, India in district Nainital has been selected for the case illustration. Hydro-informatics module consists of comprehensive study on spring hydrology and stream hydrology to assess several hydrological hazards due to climate change. Land use informatics consists of land use mapping and change diction i.e. decadal changes and annual changes whereas the Climate informatics module consists of spatial distribution of climate and its change detection through daily, monthly and annual weather data (temperature, rainfall, humidity and evaporation) of two study periods i.e. during 1985-1990 and 2005-2010. The spatial distribution of climate throughout study area suggesting three types of climatic zones i.e. sub-tropical, temperate and moist temperate which are respectively favorable for mixed forest, pine forest and oak forest in the mountain eco-system. The results of climate-informatics advocating that all these climatic zones shifting towards higher altitudes due to global climate change and affecting the favorable conditions of the existing land use pattern. In order to that the oak and pine forests have decreased respectively by 25 % (4.48 km2) and 3% (.28 km2). The non-forest area has increased dramatically due to lopping and cutting of trees, and growing agricultural activities. The non-forest area has mainly been confined to barren land, riverbed and cultivated land. Barren land increased 1.21 km2 (56%), riverbed increased 0.78 km2 (52%) and cultivated land increased about 0.63 km2 (3%) during   the period of 1990 to 2010.

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Recent Articles-IJGGS

Mapping of Landuse/Landcover Changes of Chennai Coast and Issues related to Coastal Environment Using Remote Sensing and GIS

Author(s) – Santhiya.G, Lakshumanan.C, Muthukumar.S

ABSTRACT
Coastal areas are very valuable in view of human beings and more dynamics for land use due to urbanization and industrialization. It is essential to assess the land use/land cover changes for coastal zone management, technologies like Remote sensing and GIS were used to monitor the coastal land use dynamics for the Chennai coast covers stretch of approximately 125kms from Pulicat Lake (North) to Kovalam creek (South). Survey of India Toposheet, Land sat and IRS-LISS III satellite data were used for the years 1976, 1999 and 2007. The maps were compared and changes were attributed; and show that the drastic changes in land use profile. Vegetation cover decreased from 15.49% to 11.19% during 1999-2007 & 19.49% to 15.77% (1976-1999) respectively. Due to the increased population the settlement and built up areas increased considerably 16.82% (1976), 26.20% (1999) and 31.91% (2007). Field observation shows the current status and issues of coastal environmental problems. Study suggested some remedial measures to protect the coastal environment

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Recent Articles-IJGGS

Textural characteristics and organic matter distribution patterns in Tirumalairajanar river Estuary, Tamilnadu, East Coast of India

Author(s) – Venkatramanan.S, Ramkumar.T, Anitha Mary.I

ABSTRACT
Distribution patterns of grain size characteristics and organic matter in the estuary sediments of India from Tirumalairajanar river have been studied. The present study reveals that sediment texture is one of the main controlling factors for the distribution of organic matter. The sediments are mainly medium to coarse grained, moderately to poor sorted, fine skewed to coarse skewed and leptokurtic to mesokurtic in nature. Based on the CM pattern the sediment fall in rolling and suspension field.  These textural parameters have been examined to understand hydrodynamics of the depositional environment

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