The characterisation of the territory of the city of Luanda (Angola) for the planning of quarrying activities

The integrated study of the territory through the several tools available today such as satellite images, aerial photographs, geographical information systems and data bases is necessary to schedule the planning activities for natural and territorial resources. The present work is included in a cooperation project among universities financed by the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affair. It was carried out in the years 2000-2001 by Italian and Angolan researchers and its aim was to identify analysis methods for the integrated study of the natural and territorial resources in the area of the Luanda and Bengo provinces (Angola) through the use of multi-spectral medium resolution satellite images. The use of an analytical technique such as remote sensing that consents the remote survey of the research zones is advisable especially considering the great land surveying difficulties in hazardous zones such as the studied one. The arid and semi-arid environments are considered an ideal objective for the use of remote interpretative tools since the absence of vegetation does not inhibit the lithological and structural discrimination. The physical aspects shown have essentially been the use of the territory and its geological, hydro-geological, geomorphological and environmental characteristics targeted on the possibility of using the results to study and plan the exploitation activities. The analysis regarded a vast area included in the coverage of a Landsat TM7 image. Automatic and semi-automatic classification and processing procedures have been applied on the whole image in order to single out the investigated characteristics. The more accessible zones of a hardly accessible area due to the conflict existing since Angola’s independence have been surveyed on site to directly observe the studied characteristics. This in order to ream the analyses methods and extend them into the territory’s inaccessible areas.