Contribution of Remote Sensing to the Monitoring of Environmental Parameters in the Portofino Marine Protected Area (ligurian Sea): a Preliminary Test

Coastal marine environment is a complex system and its management requires adequate information. Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) are considered pilot sites useful to define innovative tools for the Integrated Coastal Zone Management (ICZM). Their management requires however acquaintance with the relationships between the protected site and the status of the coastal neighbouring areas in order to assess mutual effects and influences. Portofino MPA (Ligurian Sea) was chosen as pilot area to the monitoring of physical and biological phenomena in order to assess possible existing differences between MPAs and their neighbouring unprotected zones. The present study shows the results of a preliminary test to approach the integration of different methodologies which could lead to an increase in the use of satellite sensors to the continuous monitoring of coastal areas. In particular it proposes an integrated analysis of data sets coming from in situ and remote-sensing data to evaluate the reliability of satellite sensors for coastal zone monitoring and to better understand the short-term environmental dynamics on the coastal area centred on the Portofino MPA. This study supplies an analysis relative to field data collected on 2004. In situ bio-physical variables were collected by means of a multiparametric probe, whereas satellite data, retrieved by optical sensor such as Medium Resolution Imaging Spectrometer (MERIS), were supplied by European Spatial Agency (ESA). The use of satellite data allowed to detect the local variability of the dynamical transient phenomena, hardly identifiable only by means of in situ data. An evaluation of MERIS products along with critical analysis of the algorithms supplied were performed; both MERIS algorithms (alg-1 and alg-2) were tested over the study area. The experience acquired so far, could lead to hypothesise that in the next years the coupling of in situ and satellite data could allow to conceive a national system to the monitoring of the dynamic of the main environmental variables along the coastal national waters.