Use of an Advanced SAR Monitoring Technique to Monitor Old Embankment Dams

The work mainly discusses the use of the Ground-Based Synthetic Aperture Radar (GBSAR) interferometry technique to observe and control the behavior of earthfill or rockfill embankments for dam impoundments. This non-invasive technique provides overall displacements patterns measured with a sub-millimeter accuracy. The need of reliable monitoring of old embankment dams is rapidly increasing since a large number of these structures are still equipped with old monitoring devices, usually installed some decades ago, which can give only information on localized areas of the embankment. A case study regarding the monitoring of an earthfill dam embankment in Southern Italy by means of GBSAR interferometry is presented.