Prospecting for coal in China with remote sensing

Abstract

With the rapid development of China's economy, coal resources are increasingly in great demand. As a result, the remaining coal reserves diminish gradually with large-scale exploitation of coal resources. Easily-found mines which used to be identified from outcrops or were buried under shallow overburden are decreasing, especially in the prosperous eastern regions of China, which experience coal shortages. Currently the main targets of coal prospecting are concealed and unidentified underground coal bodies, making it more and more difficult for coal prospecting. It is therefore important to explore coal prospecting by taking advantage of modern remote sensing and geographic information system technologies. Given a theoretical basis for coal prospecting by remote sensing, we demonstrate the methodologies and existing problems systematically by summarizing past practices of coal prospecting with remote sensing. We propose a new theory of coal prospecting with remote sensing. In uncovered areas, coal resources can be prospected for by direct interpretation. In coal bearing strata of developed areas covered by thin Quaternary strata or vegetation, prospecting for coal can be carried out by indirect interpretation of geomorphology and vegetation. For deeply buried underground deposits, coal prospecting can rely on tectonic structures, interpretation and analysis of new tectonic clues and regularity of coal formation and preservation controlled by tectonic structures. By applying newly hyper-spectral, multi-polarization, multi-angle, multi-temporal and multi-resolution remote sensing data and carrying out integrated analysis of geographic attributes, ground attributes, geophysical exploration results, geochemical exploration results, geological drilling results and remote sensing data by GIS tools, coal geology resources and mineralogical regularities can be explored and coal resource information can be acquired with some confidence.