Spatiotemporal variation in the water quality of Vembanad Lake, Kerala, India: a remote sensing approach.

Water quality is one of the essential parameters of environmental monitoring; even a slight variation in its characteristics may significantly influence the ecosystem. The water quality of Vembanad Lake is affected by anthropogenic effects such as industrial effluents and tourism. The optical parameters representing water quality, such as diffuse attenuation (Kd), turbidity, suspended particulate matter (SPM), and chlorophyll-a (Chl-a), are considered in this study to evaluate the water quality of Vembanad Lake, Kerala, India. As this lake is regarded as of ecological importance by the Ramsar Convention and has faced severe concerns over recent years, there was a substantial change in the water quality during the lockdowns of the COVID-19 pandemic. This research is aimed at examining the change in water quality using optical data from Sentinel-2 satellites in the ACOLITE processing software from 2016 to 2021. The analyses showed a 2.5% decrease in the values of Kd, whereas SPM and turbidity show a reduction of about 4.3% from the year 2016 to 2021. The flood and the COVID lockdown had an impact on the improvement in the quality of water from 2018 to 2021. The findings indicated that the reduction in industrial activities and tourism had a more significant effect on the improvement in the water quality of the lake. There was no substantial change in the Chl-a until 2020, whereas an average decrease of 12% in Chl-a values was observed throughout 2021. This decrease can be attributed to the reduction in the lake's hydrological residence time (HRT). Thus, these findings will be a valuable reference to help the government and non-government organizations (NGO) during strategic planning.

Coastal vulnerability assessment for the coast of Tamil Nadu, India-a geospatial approach.

A coastal region is a section of land that borders a significant body of water, often the sea or ocean. Despite their productivity, they are sensitive to even little alterations in the outside environment. This study aims to develop a spatial coastal vulnerability index (CVI) map for the Tamil Nadu coast of India, which has diverse coastal and marine environments that are ecologically fragile zones. Climate change is expected to increase the intensity and frequency of severe coastal hazards, such as rising sea levels, cyclones, storm surges, tsunamis, erosion, and accretion, severely impacting local environmental and socio-economic conditions. This research employed expert knowledge, weights, and scores from the analytical hierarchy process (AHP) to create vulnerability maps. The process includes the integration of various parameters such as geomorphology, Land use and land cover (LULC), significant wave height (SWH), rate of sea level rise (SLR), shoreline change (SLC), bathymetry, elevation, and coastal inundation. Based on the results, the very low, low, and moderate vulnerability regions comprise 17.26%, 30.77%, and 23.46%, respectively, whereas the high and very high vulnerability regions comprise 18.20% and 10.28%, respectively. The several locations tend to be high and very high due to land-use patterns and coastal structures, but very few are contributed by geomorphological features. The results are validated by conducting a field survey in a few locations along the coast. Thus, this study establishes a framework for decision-makers to implement climate change adaptation and mitigation actions in coastal zones.