Integrating geotechnical and SAR data for the monitoring of underground works in the Madrid urban area: Application of the Persistent Scatterer Interferometry technique

The Differential Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (DInSAR) is a powerful deformation control technique for civil engineering applications. However, the performance definition and limitations of the technique in tunneling works are far from being standardized. This work presents a thorough validation effort of the applicability of the Persistent Scatterer Interferometry (PSI) technique to the Madrid’s M-30 tunneling works. A set of 26 Envisat images, covering from August 2003 to April 2008, were processed with two PSI techniques and the results were validated with on-ground measurements from leveling benchmarks and strips. The comparison of the deformations of more than 1500 control points has led to a global deformation difference of 2.6 mm RMS and 3.5 mm RMS with a coverage of the area of interest with persistent scatterers of 65% and 34% for the two PSI algorithms used. The limitations of the PSI technique when using SAR missions with low revisit time were shown. PSI has proven the potential to complement on ground monitoring techniques in tunneling works as soon as the limitations are overcome.