Characterization of ground deformation in the Great Houston Area using Sentinel-1A/B data from 2014 to 2020

Abstract:

Land subsidence in the Great Houston area has been a prolonged process since the early 1990s. Ground deformation may damage the infrastructures and facilities, which can be extremely hazardous in metropolises like Houston, home to ~2.5 million people in the United States. Interferometric synthetic aperture radar (InSAR) method allows us to routinely monitor regional ground deformation with weekly to bi-weekly updates. Although previous GPS and InSAR studies have demonstrated an overall subsidence in Houston associated with ground-water withdrawal, aquifer compaction, and hydrocarbon extraction, the long- and short-wavelength deformation time series have been less investigated. In this study, we conduct time series InSAR analysis to extract the spatio-temporal ground deformation details using Copernicus Sentinel-1A/B data at 6-/12-day repeat frequency during 2014-2020. Deformation variabilities in the Great Houston area may suggest multiple drivers that regulate the ground deformation, such as the fault movements, halite diapirism, hydrocarbon exploration, aquifer compaction, and precipitation. We will compare the displacement measurements with GPS observations and previous InSAR results from ERS-1/2, ENVISAT, and ALOS-1 data. We will also investigate the potential correlation in the seasonal and multiannual variations between ground deformation and hydroclimatic variables.