Synthetic aperture radar for pipeline right-of-way monitoring

Charles C. Wamsley; David Draper; Todd Pett; Shane Roark

doi:10.1117/12.2504980

18 September 2018 Synthetic aperture radar for pipeline right-of-way monitoring

Charles C. Wamsley, David Draper, Todd Pett, Shane Roark

Proceedings Volume 10767, Remote Sensing and Modeling of Ecosystems for Sustainability XV; 1076706 (2018) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2504980
Event: SPIE Optical Engineering + Applications, 2018, San Diego, California, United States

Abstract

The Ball Aerospace Pipeline Damage Prevention Radar (PDPR) project evaluated the use of airborne synthetic aperture radar (SAR) to detect vehicles and equipment located within buried pipeline right-of-way areas but obscured from visual detection. The project included the configuration of a commercial dual-band SAR/EO system for airborne operations, hardware and software modifications to optimize SAR change detection processing, and the execution of multiple flight tests to characterize SAR performance for the detection of equipment obscured by vegetation. Flight tests were conducted in 2016 and 2017 using X-band, Ku-band and ultra-wide band (UWB) SAR in urban and rural environments. Targets in the open showed close to 100% detection performance while covered target results depended on the amount of vegetative canopy. Detection "through" vegetation was generally better using the UWB system, but vegetation gaps frequently allowed higher spatial resolution detections with the Ku-band system. While large equipment was frequently identifiable in the Ku-band SAR images, having coincident EO imagery proved critical for context and automated deep learning based object identification. The detection performance difference between open and covered conditions clearly illustrates how a collection plan that optimizes open viewing conditions increases the overall probability of detection. This research was performed in response to the Damage Prevention topic through the Technology Development in the Pipeline Safety Research and Development Announcement DTPH5615RA00001.

Conference Presentation

Citation Download Citation

Charles C. Wamsley, David Draper, Todd Pett, and Shane Roark "Synthetic aperture radar for pipeline right-of-way monitoring", Proc. SPIE 10767, Remote Sensing and Modeling of Ecosystems for Sustainability XV, 1076706 (18 September 2018); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2504980

ACCESS THE FULL ARTICLE

INSTITUTIONAL
Select your institution to access the SPIE Digital Library.

SELECT YOUR INSTITUTION

PERSONAL
Sign in with your SPIE account to access your personal subscriptions or to use specific features such as save to my library, sign up for alerts, save searches, etc.

PERSONAL SIGN IN

No SPIE Account? Create one

PURCHASE THIS CONTENT

SUBSCRIBE TO DIGITAL LIBRARY

50 downloads per 1-year subscription

Members: $195

Non-members: $335 ADD TO CART

25 downloads per 1 - year subscription

Members: $145

Non-members: $250 ADD TO CART

PURCHASE SINGLE ARTICLE

Includes PDF, HTML & Video, when available