Low-Cost, High-Density Field Water Quality Data Enable High-Accuracy Minimalist Remote Sensing for Local Sustainability and Resilience with Sentinel-2 Multispectral Imager

Low-cost, high-density water quality data in combination with new high-fidelity imaging satellites can enable high-accuracy simplified remote sensing of inland drinking water sources for sustainability and resilience at the local level. Remote Sensing for sustainability and resilience requires affordability and simplicity for implementation at the local level for drinking water monitoring and protection. United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) studies focused on implementing Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM) within UN Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 6.5 indicate that water pollution has worsened over the last three decades in the majority of rivers in Latin America, Africa and Asia [1] with all three areas having relatively limited information on water quality, especially for routine water management. UNEP has suggested the use of satellite remote sensing of several basic water parameters including temperature, chlorophyll a, Secchi Disk depth/transparency, turbidity and sediment dynamics with focused "water-truthing" to fill this information gap.