Mapping acidic mine waste with seasonal airborne hyperspectral imagery at varying spatial scales

Airborne imaging spectrometer (also known as hyperspectral) remote sensing has been widely used to characterize mineralogy on mine waste surfaces, which is useful for predicting potential sources of acidity and metal leaching. The most successful applications employ fine spatial resolution—20-m pixels or smaller. Future satellite imaging spectrometer sensors are proposed to provide coarser spatial resolution—30- to 60-m pixels. This study examined the ability to map minerals related to acid mine drainage with visible to shortwave infrared hyperspectral imagery at varying spatial scales (2-, 15-, 30-, 60-m pixels) at the Leviathan mine Superfund site, located in the Eastern Sierra Nevada. Mineral maps were produced using spectral angle mapper and matched filtering algorithms. The 15-m images provided comparable maps to the 2-m images. The 30- and 60-m images lost the ability to identify smaller features; however, they were still able to identify high- and low-priority remediation zones at least 75 m in width. Based on our results, we believe 30-m spatial resolution on a satellite hyperspectral sensor will be sufficient for identifying hazardous surfaces at larger mine waste sites and provide important reconnaissance information that can help prioritize detailed ground-based studies.