Plastic Litter Project 2019: Exploring the Detection of Floating Plastic Litter Using Drones and Sentinel 2 Satellite Images

Abstract

The Plastic Litter Projects (PLP) are an innovative exploratory application of open-access satellite imagery and drone data for the remote detection of artificial floating marine plastic targets in natural waters. This paper presents the second PLP, conducted in the summer of 2019 within a two month period. A main project outcome was the production of an image database containing Sentinel-2 and very high resolution RGB aerial images of artificial marine debris targets. The drone data allow for the precise positioning of the targets in Sentinel-2 images and the derivation of pixel abundance fractions. A reversed linear spectral unmixing methodology was used to calculate the spectral response of the PET target material for each Sentinel-2 10m band. Results suggest that given conditions of low glint, in the case of the PET bottle target, pixels with a relatively small plastic abundance fraction (<40%) can be successfully detected.