Abstract

Coral reefs are some of the most valuable and highly biodiverse marine ecosystems. However, they continue to be negatively affected by climate change and the increase of sea surface temperature, ocean acidification, extreme weather, and other factors. Monitoring the health of a coral reef system region is critical for informing conservation and management strategies, which are needed to improve the situation. This study focuses on developing an integrated Remote Sensing and GIS approach to assess and map coral reef health for climate change stressors. The study uses high-resolution satellite images from Sentinel-2 and Landsat 8 alongside in situ data for corroboration. Spectral indices and supervised classification distinguished between healthy, bleached, and degraded reefs. At the same time, GIS tools analyzed sea surface temperature anomalies and pollution sources near the reef's location. The spatial distribution of the health maps of the coral reefs provides information on the degree of resilience, degradation, and prioritization needed for intervention using conservation strategies. Combining these two approaches demonstrates that remote sensing and GIS can effectively monitor the ecosystem of coral reefs at reduced expense and controlled times. With the increased impacts of climate change, the research results can guide the decision-making process for protecting the reefs. They can help defend other vulnerable marine habitats worldwide, thus serving as an example framework.

Keywords: Geographic information system, Coral reef, Marine ecosystems, Monitoring, and Climate change