Analyzing Changes in Coastal Biospheres using Remote Sensing and Geographic Information System Techniques, Northern Nile Delta, Egypt

The Northern Nile Delta coastal zone in Egypt has unique environmentally sensitive conditions. The area contains a coastal lagoon protectorate El Burullus lagoon which is the landing for immigrant birds from Europe. The area contains several urban features such as an international highway, a port and some towns. Several stressors occur in the area. These are reflected by the sea level rise problem ranging between 1.2-1.3 mm/yr. The problem is magnified by land subsidence, sea water intrusion and shoreline erosion. Despite the stress, the Northern Nile Delta coastal zone is exerting severe changes. Those changes are both natural and anthropogenic causing environmental degradation of the area. This paper aims at conducting an analysis for the changes occurring and their causes. The area is studied during a period of 13 years during which major development decisions took place. Two multi-date satellite imageries, Landsat-5TM and Landsat-7 ETM+acquired in 1987 and 2000 were used. The rectified images were classified to produce the Land use/Land cover maps and a Matrix function is applied to detect and quantify the changes that occurred in each class. A model was used to discriminate the accretion and erosion zones of the shoreline. The results of the study show that the study area is undergoing both anthropogenic and natural changes. The most significant changes are reflected in the transformation of the wetlands either to water bodies used as fish farms or dried up for urbanization amounting to 23.4 km(2) or for land reclamation amounting to 25.5 km(2). Eroded shoreline amounted to 6.87 km while accreted shoreline amounted to 7.97 km during the study period. The use of Remote Sensing and geographic information system techniques provided an integrated vision for understanding the various trends and patterns of changes in the study area.