Using Space-borne Hyperspectral Imagery on Mapping Nitrogen Fertilizer Excess to the Environment

Nowadays, Farmers tend to apply high rates of fertilizers such as Nitrogen (N) in order to get a high yield. But the challenge is how to optimize nitrogen (N) management to ensure high yield production while improving N use efficiency and protecting the environment. The calculation of N nutrition index (NNI) requires destructive sampling and chemical analysis to determine biomass and plant N concentration, which is time and cost consuming and, thus, impractical for in-season site-specific N management across large areas. The objective of this study was to evaluate the potential of using space-borne hyperspectral remote sensing imagery to track excessive fertilization areas to protect environment from Nitrogen excess. The study site is located at AtTawdihiyah farm, which was conducted on a 50 ha sandy loam soil in the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia. To study the Effect of Nitrogen Fertilizer on the Environment of AtTawdihiyah region, four sets of Hyperspectral Imagery (EO-1 Path/Row 165/43) were chosen to represent the four seasons. Narrowband greenness VIs were computed. Biomass and Plant N concentration the results indicated that, all VIs used were significantly correlated with the N concentration among all seasons. However the proposed technique have been used to conduct precise Nitrogen content, it is also needs a ground based validation under different on-farm conditions using different types of satellite data