Feasibility of InSAR technologies for nationwide monitoring of geohazards in Great Britain

The objective of this study is to map the feasibility of InSAR technologies to monitor ground motion over the entire landmass of Great Britain by combining the effects of local topography and landuse. We employ medium to high resolution DEMs and account for different sensor acquisition modes and orbital characteristics (e.g., those of the European satellites ERS1/2 and ENVISAT) to evaluate the visibility of the terrain to the different acquisition geometries, identify areas affected by geometrical distortions (e.g. layover and shadow), and facilitate selection of the best modes to be employed to monitor the different areas of the landmass with InSAR. Combination of topographic visibility with land cover information then allows assessment of the probability of the targets on the ground to behave as good radar reflectors, and facilitates the estimation of the expected density of Persistent Scatterers identifiable over the different urban and rural areas of GB. The results will act as milestones for future InSAR applications to a wide range of geohazards in GB, and will show the potential of future nationwide monitoring