ARIZONA DEPARTMENT OF WATER RESOURCES LAND SUBSIDENCE MONITORING PROGRAM USING INTERFEROMETRIC SYNTHETIC APERTURE RADAR (INSAR) DATA

In 1997, the Arizona Department of Water Resources (ADWR) created a land subsidence monitoring program. The program initially focused on monitoring land subsidence in the east valley of the Phoenix Metropolitan area, what is known as the Hawk Rock Area, using survey-grade Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) equipment. In 2002, ADWR was awarded a 3-year $1.3 million NASA grant to expand the land subsidence monitoring program to include Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar data (InSAR). Upon completion of the NASA grant in 2005, ADWR quickly migrated to a land subsidence program that primarily utilized InSAR data using GNSS surveying to support the program. With the InSAR data, ADWR has identified more than 26 individual land subsidence features in Arizona, collectively covering more than 3,400 square miles. In addition, the program now cooperates with 14 entities whose financial assistance allows ADWR to fund the InSAR data collection. ADWR provides land subsidence maps for download from ADWR’s website. As of February 2019, 460 land subsidence maps are available for download and are used daily by geologists, hydrologists, engineers, planners, surveyors, floodplain managers, GIS analysts, and water resources managers.