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Journal Article

Artisanal and Small-Scale Mining Sites in the Democratic Republic of the Congo Are Not Associated with Nighttime Light Emissions

Authors
/persons/resource/kyba

Kyba,  C.
1.4 Remote Sensing, 1.0 Geodesy, Departments, GFZ Publication Database, Deutsches GeoForschungsZentrum;

Giuliani,  Grégory
External Organizations;

Franziskakis,  Florian
External Organizations;

Tockner,  Klement
External Organizations;

Lacroix,  Pierre
External Organizations;

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4147905.pdf
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Citation

Kyba, C., Giuliani, G., Franziskakis, F., Tockner, K., Lacroix, P. (2019): Artisanal and Small-Scale Mining Sites in the Democratic Republic of the Congo Are Not Associated with Nighttime Light Emissions. - J-Multidisciplinary Scientific Journal, 2, 2, 152-161.
https://doi.org/10.3390/j2020013


Cite as: https://gfzpublic.gfz-potsdam.de/pubman/item/item_4147905
Abstract
Maintaining records of artisanal and small-scale mining sites in developing countries requires considerable effort, so it would be beneficial if Earth observation data from space could assist in the identifying and monitoring of such sites. Artificial light emissions are common at industrial-scale mining sites and have been associated with small-scale illegal mining in some contexts. Here, we examine whether known artisanal and small-scale mining sites in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) are associated with observations of night light emissions by the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite Day/Night Band (DNB). Light emissions from the mining sites were not observed: the radiance observed from the sites was near zero and nearly identical to that observed for a set of randomly-chosen locations in the same region. While it is the case that DNB night lights’ products provide useful data in other resource extraction contexts, they do not appear to be useful for identifying artisanal mining sites in the DRC.