Mining Weekly | By Keith Campbell | 2nd June 2017:
JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) – At last month’s International Symposium on Remote Sensing of the Environment, held at the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), in Pretoria, one of the very many topics addressed was the use of remote sensing, particularly from earth observation (EO) satellites, to support the mining sector. This is an emerging endeavour but it is already showing much promise.
GLOBAL PROMISE
“Oil, gas and mineral deposits are the raw materials that drive the global economy,” points out the European Space Agency on its website. “As existing reserves dwindle, ensuring an adequate supply for the future requires the exploration of frontier regions for new supplies. Hospitable and inaccessible environments such as desert and Arctic regions are increasingly the focus of survey activities, but exploration managers find it demanding to operate in such uncharted territory, often lacking detailed maps and basic geological information about the areas they are interested in.
EO makes possible the large-scale surveying of unexplored regions in a cost-effective manner, providing an additional layer of information to managers before they make the expensive decision to commit to on-site exploration. Satellite data can map and identify large-scale geological structures related to hydrocarbon and mineral deposits that ground-based surveys may find more difficult to see: satellite radar interferometry can precisely identify surface faults or slight ground motion connected with hydrocarbon reservoirs. Multi-spectral optical sensors can directly identify different minerals, either valuable in their own right or chemi- cally altered by contacts with oil and gas deposits . . . As well as assisting with direct search efforts, satellite images can also provide indirect logistics support, for instance planning the most effective placing of sound sources and geophones in order to carry out a seismic survey, or selecting the most suitable sites for extraction facilities.”
Satellite imagery can also be used to identify, monitor and help address the various impacts of mining and hydrocarbons extraction, such as various forms of pollution (including acid mine drainage), subsidence and the impact on the environment. “Until recently, satellite imagery has lacked the spatial, temporal and radiometric resolution to compete especially at small scale and quantification of target materials,” notes the EO Miners website. (EO Miners is a project of the European Commission.) But, with the most recent EO satellites and sensors, this has changed. And not only are the sensors on the satellites getting better, but they are also getting cheaper.
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