Determination of suspended load concentration in Hendijan Delta using remote sensing technique

Suspended Load Concentration (SLC) estimation is one of the most important environmental and engineering issues in the coastal zone. The SLC distribution pattern near the coast can be determined by in situ measurement and combination with remote sensing products according to the topography and the types of dominant currents in the study area. The research objective was to identify the spatial and temporal variations of the surface SLC in the Hendijan Delta (Northern Persian Gulf) using remote sensing technique. The water samples were taken from more than 60 stations during the passage of the Landsat 8/OLI satellite over the study area on Feb. 20, 2016 and Feb. 6, 2017. The range of SLC variations was obtained between (0-740)  mgl-1. Atmospheric correction was applied using SWIR algorithm on Landsat 8/OLI images to estimate the net water reflectance. There is a high correlation between  provided from satellite data and the measured SLC. The empirical algorithm got an exponential form with the combination of the bands 4 and 5 performed using statistical tests. For developing this algorithm more than 50 types of equations were assessed. The proposed algorithm determines the SLC from the Landsat 8/OLI images with Pearson’s 0.93, root mean square error 28.12 mgl-1 and relative root mean square error 34.24%. The algorithm was applied to timescale of satellite images, and the spatial distribution of suspended sediment concentration has been mapped over the Hendijan Delta. According to this results, the rate of decline in SLC from near the coast to the distance of 5 km of the Hendijan Delta was estimated about 2800 to 20 mgl-1 on Feb 20, 2016 and 800 mgl-1 on Feb 6, 2017. Landsat images can be used effectively to retrieved SLC in the Hendijan River Delta.