Detecting the Influence of Hydrocarbon Seepage on Plants: A Spectroscopic Approach

The health of vegetation could be affected by oil leakage through micro-seepage phenomena. In the present study, we used spectroscopic analysis in the VIS-NIR region to monitor and characterize plant's health affected by the hydrocarbon micro-seepage. For this purpose, we used same plant species subjected to different soil conditions with the same soil type. The spectral acquisition has been performed using SVC-HR768i spectroradiometer on every 15-day interval. The plant's physical appearance and red-edge position along with vegetation indices like NDVI, CARI, PRI and WDRVI were derived to observe the temporal change in plant growth. The results indicated red-edge position shifted towards shorter wavelength region and vegetation indices were showing stress in the plant subjected to the hydrocarbon mixed soil condition, possibly due to hydrocarbon micro-seepage. This study could be used in the application of remote sensing data to identify the hydrocarbon micro-seepage region, especially in highly vegetated land cover.