A NEW OBJECT-ORIENTED METHODOLOGY TO DETECT OIL SPILLS USING

ENVISAT IMAGES

K. Topouzelis(1), V. Karathanassi(2), P. Pavlakis(3), D. Rokos(2)

(1)
DG Joint Research Centre (EC), Institute for the Protection and Security of the Citizen, Via Fermi 1, 21020, Ispra,
VA, Italy, kostas.topouzelis@jrc.it
(2)
Laboratory of Remote Sensing, School of Rural and Surveying Engineering, National Technical University of Athens,
Heroon Polytechniou 9, Zographos, 15780, Greece, karathan@survey.ntua.gr, rslab@survey.ntua.gr
(3)
Hellenic Centre for Marine Research, P.O.Box 712, 19013 Anavissos, Attika, Greece, ppavla@ath.hcmr.gr

ABSTRACT radar signals. For this reason, a dark formation appears

Besides accidental pollution caused by ships in distress,
different types of routine ship operations lead to
deliberate discharges of oil in the sea. Illicit discharges
are the greatest source of marine pollution from ships,
and the one which poses a long-term threat to the
marine and coastal environment. Satellite monitoring, in
particular using Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR)
observations, may represent an effective tool for
complementing traditional aerial surveillance. The
capability of SAR in detecting oil slicks over the sea
surface is well known and proven since a long time. A
new automated methodology for oil spill detection was
previously presented using ERS full resolution SAR
data. In the present study a first attempt to examine the
technique to ASAR ENVISAT medium resolution
scenes was performed. The methodology relies on the
object oriented approach and profits of image
segmentation techniques in order for dark formations to
be detected. A fuzzy classification method is used to
classify dark formations to oils spill or look-alikes.
1. INTRODUCTION
Oil spills seriously affect the marine ecosystem and
cause political and scientific concern since they have
serious effects on fragile marine and coastal ecosystems.
The amount of pollutant discharges and associated
effects on the marine environment are important
parameters in evaluating sea water quality. While it is
very well known that accidental pollution at sea can be
reduced but never completely eliminated, illegal
discharges from ships can indeed be eliminated by the
strict enforcement of existing regulations and the
control, monitoring and surveillance of maritime traffic.
SAR systems are extensively used for the dark
formation detection in the marine environment, as they
are not affected by local weather conditions and
cloudiness and occupy day to night. SAR systems detect
dark formations on the sea surface indirectly, through
the modification dark formations cause on the wind
generated short gravity – capillary waves [1]. Several
manmade and natural ocean phenomena damp these
waves which are the primary backscatter agents of the
dark on SAR imagery in contrast to the surrounding
clean sea. Dark formations can be [1]: oil spills, low
wind areas, organic film, wind front areas, areas
sheltered by land, rain cells, current shear zones, grease
ice, internal waves and upwelling zones.
Several studies aiming at oil spill detection using SAR
images have been implemented [2-15]. Most of these
studies rely on the detection of dark areas which in a
later step are classified as oil spills or look-alikes. Any
formation on the image which is darker than the
surrounding area has a high probability of being an oil
spill and needs further examination. Although this
process seems to be simple for a human operator, it
contains three main difficulties if semi-automated or
automated methods are used. First, fresh oil spills are
brighter than older spills. They have a weak
backscattering contrast relative to their surroundings
and thus cannot be easily discriminated. Second, areas
surrounding dark areas can have various contrast values,
depending on local sea state, oil spill type and image
resolution. Third, other phenomena may appear as dark
areas. Further classification of the dark areas to oil spills
and look-alikes is therefore required.
The aim of this work is to detect mineral oil spills
resulting from illegal ship discharges. In a previous
study a new object methodology was developed using
ERS PRI data. In the present study the method was
tested to ENVISAT medium resolution data.
Following the idea of thinking globally and acting
locally, the methodology introduces four innovative
points. The first is the segmentation of the image into
large image segments with different statistical values,
instead of the arbitrary cutting of the image in windows.
Oil spills are thereupon not partially contained in image
windows, and for each large segment a threshold
adaptive to its local contrast can be estimated. Second, a
very detailed scale segmentation is implemented and
statistical values of each small segment are compared to
the threshold of the big segment to which it belongs.
Consequently, the methodology developed takes
advantage of the different contrast and intensity values
which are contained in a single ASAR image and

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Proc. ‘Envisat Symposium 2007’, Montreux, Switzerland
23–27 April 2007 (ESA SP-636, July 2007)
detects dark areas with various brightness values located
in different sea-state environments. Third, once dark
areas are identified, they are not isolated from the image
but are still considered as parts of its ‘whole’. The
classification stage is performed using features of the
dark areas but also taking into consideration features of
the surrounding areas. At this stage, dark areas are
classified as oil spill or look-alikes, using fuzzy
classification logic. Fourth, the method uses two distinct
knowledge bases, each one adaptive to a different type
of sea environment. In case of intense image fabric with
local anomalies and/or instantaneous wind stop areas,
the mean brightness of the large segment created by the
methodology is reduced and the shape and boundaries
of dark objects are modified. On the contrary, in a
relatively bright and smooth sea environment, dark
objects present high contrast, are more precisely defined
and their detection is easier.
2. METHODOLOGY
The methodology developed relies on an object oriented
approach. More detailed presentation can be found at
[13]. The methodology has been developed in the
eCognition Software environment. The software
introduces a new classification technology called
‘Object Oriented Image Classification’ in which in first
step extracts homogeneous image objects in any chosen
resolution that are subsequently classified by means of
fuzzy logic. The basic strategy is to build up a
hierarchical network of image objects, which allows the
representation of the image information content at
different resolutions (scales) simultaneously. By
operating on the relations between networked objects, it
is possible to classify local context information. The
developed methodology requires six main steps for its
implementation (see figure 1). User imports the original
ASAR image to a model for the 8-bit transformation
and the filtering steps. The model’s outputs (8-bit
ASAR image and filtered images) are imported to
eCognition and without any user contribution result is
given through a specific protocol which is responsible
for the next steps (segmentation, dark area detection,
object union and object classification).
Transformation from 16 to 8 bit was made using the
simple rescale min-max algorithm with the max value to
be equal with the mean value plus three times the
standard deviation value (equivalent to 99.73% of the
data distribution). Filtering was done using a specific
combination of a 3x3 Lee filter to the original image,
followed by a 5x5 Lee filter and a 7x7 Local Region
filter. The combination has been previously used with
success [16]. The three-layer image produced (original
ASAR image, mean filter, combination of Lee and
Local Region filters) was used for image segmentation.
Segmentation occurred at two different scales: a very
detailed and a very broad scale. The detailed scale factor
was used in order to create very small objects capable of
describing every formation in the SAR image. The
broad scale factor was used in order to break off the
ASAR image to large, as uniform as possible, areas.
8-bit transformation
Filtering
Segmentation
Small scale Coarse scale
Dark area detection
Object Union
Knowledge base I
Knowledge base II
Object-based classification
Result
Figure 1. Flow diagram of the used methodology
Dark area detection occurred using a threshold
algorithm which was implemented in two stages. In the
first stage, a formula based on the statistical values of
super objects was developed and small objects with low
brightness and high contrast values relative to their
surroundings were characterised as dark areas.
However, fresh oil spills or broken parts of an oil spill
were not satisfactorily identified. A second formula was
applied, in which the statistical values of the super
objects were based on pixels not characterised as dark
areas in the first stage. Factors and formulas can be
found in [13]. All small objects characterized as dark
areas are then grouped in order for statistical features
such as area, shape and texture to be estimated. Object
union resulted in the classification of the image into two
categories: dark objects and rough sea.
Based on dark objects, several features can be derived,
such as mean value, perimeter, complexity, texture, etc.
The knowledge base which was created from them uses
a fuzzy based logic in order for dark objects to be
classified as oil spills or look-alikes. Thorough analysis
of the sea environment has shown that discrimination
between oil spills and look-alikes is unsatisfactory when
a single base is used. Therefore two knowledge bases,
depending on the brightness of the super object, i.e. the
sea state, were developed. They include the same Red colour presents the oil spills detected, light blue
features but use different rules for the characterization look-alikes, and blue the sea.
of oil spills.

A set of 10 features was introduced in the knowledge

bases. A special study was performed in order to choose
which features will be used [17]. The proposed
combination was found very efficient in distinguishing
oil spills from look-alikes.

Classification was performed using fuzzy logic. Fuzzy

rules are easily understood and can be applied on every
feature selected. Each of the 10 features was considered
a separate class. Each class consists of a set of fuzzy
expressions, allowing the estimation of the specific
values and their logical operation.

The method can be used in operational scale for

detecting oil spills from medium resolution ASAR data.
The user has only to contribute in terms of importing the
original ASAR image and products derived from them.
The computational time of the proposed methodology
on a medium resolution ASAR image is 2-5 minutes.

3. DATASET
The methodology developed has been applied on a
dataset of four ENVISAT ASAR medium resolution
images. The dataset contains several sea states and all
images contain a certain number of dark objects. Two of
the images contain at least one oil spill, while the other
two contain only look-alike features. For illustration
reasons the implementation of the methodology is
presented on two ASAR images: the first one (Figure 2)
captured on 28/7/2006 (orbit 23050, frame 2242) and
the second one (Figure 3) captured on 21/7/2006 (orbit
22950, frame 1464). The two images present different
sea states and contain oil spills and look-alikes. Figure 2. ENVISAT ASAR medium resolution image
Moreover, each image presents a spatial sea-state containing oil spills and the classification result
variation. The images have been thoroughly analyzed by
three different experts using visual photo-interpretation From figure 2, describing the results on the ASAR
techniques. The first image presents a rough sea surface, image with the oils spills, it can be seen that the four old
efficient to produce a strong contrast signal in the oils spills in the left part were successfully detected.
presence of oil spills. It contains four old oil spills in the Figure 4 focuses on the bigger oil spill in the left part of
left part and a fresh oil spill in the right part. It also the image. On the contrary the fresh oil spill at the right
contains a look-alike on the left part, very close to land. part of the image in figure 2 was not detected. The
Sea state is ideal for oil spill detection, as wind speed is failure occurred at the dark detection phase. The method
estimated 3.4 m/sec. The second image contains very successfully separated the image in four big segments
complicated features. Wind speed varies from 0 m/sec but the difference of the small segments, describing the
to 4 m/sec, making oil spill detection a rather difficult fresh spill, from their bigger segment was not enough in
task. The image contains several look-alikes towards the order to detect the dark object. Therefore there was no
area next to the land. object describing the fresh spill in the stage of
classification. The backscattering values of the fresh
spill are not into the limits derived from the fresh spills
4. RESULTS
which were previously examined on ERS PRI scenes.
The result of the analysis for the above mentioned
ENVISAT ASAR images are presented in figures 2-5. Figure 3 illustrates the result of the analysis of the
second image which contains only look-alikes. Here the
classification method worked successfully as all the
dark features were correctly classified as look-alikes. In
figure 5 a more detailed example is given for a look-
alike which is located in the upper left part of figure 3.
Figure 3. ENVISAT ASAR medium resolution image
containing look-alikes and the classification result
5. CONCLUSIONS - DISCUSSION
In the present study a new automated methodology for
oil spill detection using ENVISAT ASAR medium
resolution data is presented. The methodology was
previously developed for ERS PRI data. Several factors
had to be changed, i.e. scales segmentation and fuzzy
limits in order to work satisfactorily in several oil spill
detection cases for ENVISAT scenes. Oil spills
morphological characteristics and backscattering values
are not the same in high and medium resolution scenes,
therefore a specific study is required to adapt them in
each resolution.
The proposed methodology yields two main advantages.
First, its results are not affected by sea state conditions
and second, the method is independent of the original
ASAR data quality (sensor calibration status, speckle,
atmospheric conditions etc). Moreover, dark objects are
not isolated from the image and therefore neighbouring
rules can be used for classification phase. The
importance of the last point can be seen from figures 4
and 5. Even an expert can not distinguish the oil spill
from look-alike when only these parts of the images are
examined. On the contrary, analysis is much easier
when consideration is taken for the neighbouring
features.
Further research on this issue includes validation of the
method on more images with various sea states and
types of oil spills. Moreover, a comparison between the
proposed method and a statistical based one has to be
done, using as inputs the same ASAR data which should
contain verified oil spills and look-alikes.
Figure 4. An oil spill example and its classification

Figure 5. A look-alike example and its classification
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