DIGITAL PROCESSING OF LANDSAT IMAGES TO DETECT IRONAND KAOLIN DEPOSITS IN SELECTED SITES IN THE WESTERNDESERT OF IRAQ

Abstract

The study is carried out for selected areas in the Western Desert of Iraq that are
characterized by the occurrence of iron and kaolin mineral deposits .The study aims
to create active and suitable images to detect the mineral deposits depending on the
digital image processing for satellite images using ERDAS-9 and ARC GIS 9.1
software. The study deals with ETM+ images to create image-fusion that were
processed to identify the spectral response of each of Iron and kaolin in the selected
areas. As well as available data of geological field survey were used to prepare the information layers associated with the attribute tables of the wells and quarries. The
results show good agreement between remote sensing technique and the field work
survey; a quantitative approach was established to estimate the occurrences of iron
deposits in terms of spectral responses that are obtained from image processing. Iron
deposits appear in yellowish green signatures on RGB (Red, Green, Blue) 4, 7, 2
while Kaolin deposits appear in reddish magenta on RGB 4, 7, 5. Image fusion of
HPF (High Pass Filter) and WT (Wavelet Transform) are assigned as the most
suitable algorithms used in the study. Image-ratio of 5/1 and 3/1 are active and
suitable to detect the light tone of iron mineral deposits, while the high spectral
response of kaolin deposits is detected on the image of 5/7.