Principal Investigator:

Sponsor:
NASA LCLUC

Time period:
2023
to
2025

Graduate Researchers:

Abstract:

This project aims to characterize the dynamics of energy land use and conduct a comprehensive assessment of the environmental impacts associated with energy LCLUC in the Permian Basin. Specific objectives of the project are to 1) characterize long-term oil and gas LCLUC dynamics over the past four decades using a combination of Landsat observations, very-high-resolution aerial images, machine learning and deep learning algorithms, 2) attribute the land source of oil and gas fields using a sample-based approach and evaluate the impacts on ecosystem services, 3) characterize the geohazard risks induced by oil and gas extraction using interferometric synthetic aperture radar data, and 4) assess the vulnerability of local communities to hazard exposure and investigate environmental justice in the region. By focusing on the environmental impacts of oil and gas production at local and regional scales, our investigation will complement the well-established scientific literature on CO2 emissions and climate change resulted from oil and gas consumption.