Remote-sensing GIS based investigations of coal fires in northern China; global monitoring to support the estimation of CO2 emissions from spontaneous combustion of coal

摘要

The uncontrolled fires burning of coal seams, stock piles and waste dumps pose one of the major threats in the coal mining areas world over. Besides burning of non-renewable energy resources, these fires cause immense environmental pollution. The gaseous emissions from coal fires are a major contributor to the phenomenon of global warming. At a regional scale besides, detecting and mapping the coal fires, our research focuses on a base line inventory of the CO2 emissions from the coal fires, which would reflect the present scenario and the future projected, should the coal fire projects not be undertaken. It will also estimate the actual CO2 reduction, should the existing coal fires be successfully extinguished. Higher resolution multispectral thermal infrared data from new satellite and airborne missions such as ASTER, FOCUS, BIRD, MODIS are used along with field investigations that serve as a tool to detect, map, monitor and model (in 3-D) individual fires. Gaseous emission products are generated based on the integration of high resolution IR imagery and high resolution IR spectrometry, allowing to estimate the burning efficiency and the emission factors from coal fires.