Application of Remote Sensing and GIS Techniques for Monitoring Water Volume Variations in Inaccessible Reservoirs

Change detection processes using remote sensing and Geographic Information System (GIS) techniques were applied to monitor and estimate the water volume in the Mosul Dam reservoir during a period in which it was inaccessible due to ISIS occupation of the Province of Mosul. A total of 17 scenes of LANDSAT 8 images have been captured and the calculated areas have been used to estimate the water level (WL) and water volume (V) in the reservoir using the volume–area–elevation curve that was developed in 2011. The results indicated that WL ranged between a minimum of 308.5 m and a maximum of 321 m, while V ranged between 3.95 and 6.8 km3 for the minimum and maximum WL, respectively. For the blackout period with missing data, the monthly reservoir inflows (RIs) from the drainage watershed and the mean inflows were calculated and found to be compatible with the mean inflows of Mosul reservoir for the years 1986–2011.