Remote Sensing of Forest Structural Changes Due to the Recent Boom of Unconventional Shale Gas Extraction Activities in Appalachian Ohio

Abstract

Dense unconventional shale gas extraction activities have occurred in Appalachian Ohio since 2010 and they have caused various landcover changes and forest fragmentation issues. This research investigated the most recent boom of unconventional shale gas extraction activities and their impacts on the landcover changes and forest structural changes in the Muskingum River Watershed in Appalachian Ohio. Triple-temporal high-resolution natural-color aerial images from 2006 to 2017 and a group of ancillary geographic information system (GIS) data were first used to digitize the landcover changes due to the recent boom of these unconventional shale gas extraction activities. Geographic object-based image analysis (GEOBIA) was then employed to form forest patches as image objects and to accurately quantify the forest connectivity. Lastly, the initial and updated forest image objects were used to quantify the loss of core forest as the two-dimensional (2D) forest structural changes, and initial and updated canopy height models (CHMs) derived from airborne light detection and ranging (LiDAR) point clouds were used to quantify the loss of forest volume as three-dimensional (3D) forest structural changes. The results indicate a consistent format but uneven spatiotemporal development of these unconventional shale gas extraction activities. Dense unconventional shale gas extraction activities formed two apparent hotspots. Two-thirds of the well pad facilities and half of the pipeline right-of-way (ROW) corridors were constructed during the raising phase of the boom. At the end of the boom, significant forest fragmentation already occurred in both hotspots of these active unconventional shale gas extraction activities, and the areal loss of core forest reached up to 14.60% in the densest concentrated regions of these activities. These results call for attention to the ecological studies targeted on the forest fragmentation in the Muskingum River Watershed and the broader Appalachian Ohio regions.

Energy production and well site disturbance from conventional and unconventional natural gas development in West Virginia

“…The development of COG and UOG has documented impacts on land resources in the Appalachian Basin. These include increasing forest fragmentation (Drohan et al 2012 , Donnelly et al 2017 , Langlois et al 2017 , Liu 2021 ), accelerated forest canopy loss (Young et al 2018 ), disturbance to avian communities (Farwell et al 2020 ; Johnson et al 2010 ), and impairment of water quality caused by increased sedimentation in local stream systems (Olmstead et al 2013 ). In the current study, environmental monitoring was focused on land area disturbance and terrain features associated with well pads.…”

“…A more important observation is the fact that UOG wells were drilled in grassland areas significantly more often than COG wells. While research in the Appalachian basin has shown that UOG can have significant impacts on core forest (Drohan et al 2012 , Donnelly et al 2017 , Langlois et al 2017 , Liu 2021 ), it is important to note that from a forest fragmentation standpoint, COG wells would have greater cumulative impacts based on development patterns and density (Appiah et al 2020 ; Scanlon et al 2017 ) than UOG wells in WV.…”

“…To identify land use changes due to well pads, the disturbance associated with well locations was visually determined using NAIP imagery (Table 1 ). NAIP imagery has been used in several similar studies to assess land cover characteristics in areas of unconventional development (Drohan et al 2012 ; Jantz et al 2014 ; Slonecker et al 2012a ; Pierre et al 2018 ; Liu 2021 ). A temporal range of orthophotos was used in this study to determine the baseline surface conditions for a well prior to natural gas development, and those occurring after natural gas development had taken place.…”

Monitoring the Spatio-Temporal Dynamics of Shale Oil/Gas Development with Landsat Time Series: Case Studies in the USA

“…The local land cover and ecological environment are often artificially changed during the process of shale oil/gas development [14]. Therefore, acquiring land cover through a long-term remote sensing time series to monitor land disturbance provides the most important and practical method for monitoring shale oil/gas development [15].…”

Collocating pipelines to minimize fragmentation: evaluating ecological costs of a shale gas mitigation practice

“…Extensive infrastructure is required to facilitate shale gas extraction including well pads, water impoundments, pipelines, and access roads. Pipelines comprise the single largest portion of the industry's spatial footprint (Farwell et al 2016, Donnelly et al 2017, Langlois et al 2017, Young et al 2018, Liu 2021) and are the primary cause of habitat loss and fragmentation in a forested landscape (Langlois et al 2017, Liu 2021). One mitigation policy recommended to reduce the loss of core forest is to collocate shale gas pipelines with existing surface disturbance whenever feasible, including road networks and right‐of‐way corridors (Bearer et al 2012, Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources [PADCNR] 2014, Abrahams et al 2015, Donnelly et al 2017).…”