GB-InSAR monitoring of vegetated and snow-covered slopes in remote mountainous environments

As a member of the International Consortium on Landslides, the University of Alberta is actively working to improve technologies for monitoring natural hazards. Though ground-based, interferometric, synthetic aperture radar (GB-InSAR) has been successfully implemented for near real-time monitoring of natural and man-made slopes, it has seen limited use in Canada outside of the mining industry. This lack of adoption in the rural areas of Canada is due to difficulties associated with providing continuous power to remote sites, other logistical challenges, and concerns with the impact of snow cover on the data collected. This paper presents the results of a project to install a GB-InSAR system to monitor a 2 to 3 million m3 bedrock landslide with a measured average rate of displacement of ~ 10 mm/year. The site is characterized by long periods of deep snow cover, cold temperatures, no connection to the electrical grid, and a location within a steep valley that limits hours of daylight for solar power. Challenges with, and solutions developed for, the deployment of GB-InSAR equipment at this site are described, and the results of the monitoring program are validated with existing geotechnical instrumentation.