https://doi.org/10.4081/jae.2024.1623

Satellite remote sensing for monitoring citrus orchards water requirements at the irrigation district scale

Early Access
Published: 31 October 2024
Sentinel-2, supervised classification, agro-hydrological models, irrigation volumes
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Authors

Giuseppe Longo-Minnolo
giuseppe.longominnolo@unict.it
Department of Agriculture, Food and Environment (Di3A), University of Catania, Italy.
Alessandro D’Emilio
Department of Agriculture, Food and Environment (Di3A), University of Catania, Italy.
Juan Miguel Ramírez-Cuesta
Department of Agriculture, Food and Environment (Di3A), University of Catania, Italy.
Daniela Vanella
Department of Agriculture, Food and Environment (Di3A), University of Catania, Italy.
Serena Guarrera
Department of Agriculture, Food and Environment (Di3A), University of Catania, Italy.
Giacoma Manerchia Maserà
International Doctorate in Agricultural, Food and Environmental Science (Di3A), University of Catania, Italy.
Simona Consoli
Department of Agriculture, Food and Environment (Di3A), University of Catania, Italy.

In Italy, irrigated agriculture is often managed by Reclamation Consortia, but they generally lack the proper tools for monitoring the irrigation water requirements (IWR), forbidding the required sustainability level by the European Water Framework Directive. In this context, the study aims at monitoring the IWR of citrus orchards of a Sicilian irrigation district by implementing a satellite-based methodological approach, during the irrigation seasons 2019 and 2020. Firstly, neural networks were implemented to map the citrus orchards, by using Normalized Difference Vegetation Index time series as input, and obtaining accuracy values of 94% and 87%, in 2019 and 2020, respectively. Then, the satellite-based ArcDualKc model was used to estimate crop evapotranspiration (ETc) over the identified citrus orchards. The estimated ETc rates were validated at the farm scale in terms of irrigation volumes and compared to those obtained by the traditional FAO-56 approach. Then, the spatially distributed irrigation volumes estimated at district level were compared with those declared by the Reclamation Consortium, obtaining absolute error values of 3.28 Mm3 (294%) and 7.08 Mm3 (647%) for the years 2019 and 2020, respectively. The results of the study confirmed the usefulness of the satellite-based methodological approach for determining spatial distributed IWR estimates.

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How to Cite

Longo-Minnolo, G. (2024) “Satellite remote sensing for monitoring citrus orchards water requirements at the irrigation district scale”, Journal of Agricultural Engineering. doi: 10.4081/jae.2024.1623.
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