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Monitoring holopelagic Sargassum spp. along the Mexican Caribbean coast: understanding and addressing user requirements for satellite remote sensing

de la Barreda-Bautista, Betsabé; Metcalfe, Sarah E.; Smith, Geoff; Sjögersten, Sofie; Boyd, Doreen S.; Cerdeira-Estrada, Sergio; López-Ramírez, Pablo; Magaldi, Adolfo; Ressl, Rainer; Perera-Valderrama, Susana; Caballero-Aragon, Hansel; Siordia, Oscar S.; Couldridge, Jonathan; Gray, Paul; Silva, Rodolfo; Van Tussenbroek, Brigitta I.; Escalante‐Mancera, Edgar; Foody, Giles

Monitoring holopelagic Sargassum spp. along the Mexican Caribbean coast: understanding and addressing user requirements for satellite remote sensing Thumbnail


Authors

Geoff Smith

SOFIE SJOGERSTEN Sofie.Sjogersten@nottingham.ac.uk
Professor of Environmental Science

DOREEN BOYD doreen.boyd@nottingham.ac.uk
Professor of Earth Observation

Sergio Cerdeira-Estrada

Pablo López-Ramírez

Adolfo Magaldi

Rainer Ressl

Susana Perera-Valderrama

Hansel Caballero-Aragon

Oscar S. Siordia

Jonathan Couldridge

Paul Gray

Rodolfo Silva

Brigitta I. Van Tussenbroek

Edgar Escalante‐Mancera

GILES FOODY giles.foody@nottingham.ac.uk
Professor of Geographical Information



Abstract

Massive influxes of holopelagic Sargassum spp. (Sargassum natans and S. fluitans) have been causing major economic, environmental and ecological problems along the Caribbean coast of Mexico. Predicting the arrival of the sargassum as an aid to addressing these problems is a priority for the government, coastal communities and the society; both mitigating the impacts and providing opportunities for its use. Lack of data concerning precise locations and times of sargassum beachings means that public and private funds are being spent inefficiently and most actions are reactive. The dynamic nature of sargassum beachings/influxes render conventional ground-based monitoring insufficient. Earth observation and cloud-based processing services offer tools to track, quantify and understand sargassum beaching remotely in a frequent, systematic and reliable manner with the temporal and spatial resolutions required for its management. In order to find the right solutions to address this problem, in this paper the needs and requirements of stakeholders are taken into consideration for the development of an Earth observation-based service to monitor sargassum along the Mexican Caribbean coast. Routine monitoring of sargassum over a large area will be cost effective and help mitigate the negative effects of sargassum influxes. The combination of imagery from Planet, specifically their SuperDove systems that provide daily data at 3 m spatial resolutions, with the freely available EU Copernicus data would be useful for many different stakeholders and potential users. A prototype of the service is presented, based on the main user requirements. The system would enable public and private organizations to allocate resources appropriately in affected areas quickly and efficiently, thereby minimizing economic, social and environmental impacts and enhancing the resilience of local communities. It would also assist the sargassum industry in the collection of fresh algae for onward processing. The system could easily be implemented for similar types of environmental monitoring in the Greater Caribbean and beyond.

Citation

de la Barreda-Bautista, B., Metcalfe, S. E., Smith, G., Sjögersten, S., Boyd, D. S., Cerdeira-Estrada, S., …Foody, G. (2023). Monitoring holopelagic Sargassum spp. along the Mexican Caribbean coast: understanding and addressing user requirements for satellite remote sensing. Frontiers in Marine Science, 10, Article 1166000. https://doi.org/10.3389/fmars.2023.1166000

Journal Article Type Article
Acceptance Date May 8, 2023
Online Publication Date May 24, 2023
Publication Date May 24, 2023
Deposit Date Jun 1, 2023
Publicly Available Date Jun 1, 2023
Journal Frontiers in Marine Science
Electronic ISSN 2296-7745
Publisher Frontiers Media
Peer Reviewed Peer Reviewed
Volume 10
Article Number 1166000
DOI https://doi.org/10.3389/fmars.2023.1166000
Keywords Pelagic sargassum, monitoring, earth observation, Mexico, Caribbean, sargassum management, sargassum use, sargassum solutions
Public URL https://nottingham-repository.worktribe.com/output/21113049
Publisher URL https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fmars.2023.1166000/full

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