Ground deformation caused by natural hazards or construction activities can pose risks to people, infrastructure and the environment. Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (InSAR), a satellite-based remote sensing technique, offers promising capabilities for monitoring surface deformation with high spatial and temporal resolution. Despite its technical potential, the use of InSAR in civil and geo-engineering projects and for natural hazard assessment remains limited. This study investigates both the technical and non-technical factors influencing the integration of InSAR in practice. Through a comprehensive literature review and interviews with InSAR users and providers, this research identifies key benefits and obstacles for implementation and provides recommendations to improve the uptake of InSAR in civil engineering, geo-engineering and natural hazards projects. The findings highlight the need for interdisciplinary collaboration, clear communication, training and the development of application-specific tools and guidelines to facilitate wider adoption of InSAR in engineering practice.
Next, an operational framework is developed for using InSAR in accordance with geotechnical design standards, such as Eurocode 7, throughout all phases of infrastructure projects. The proposed framework is a practical tool that can be used by planners and engineers in the whole lifecycle of an infrastructure project. Finally, the study examines two practical InSAR applications. First, the use of InSAR in a shield tunnelling project in an urban environment is investigated. The applicability of InSAR prior, during, and after tunnel construction is evaluated. Special emphasis is placed on the influence of the InSAR phase ambiguities in relation to short-term settlements that may occur during tunnel construction. Second, the use of a persistent scatterer interferometry (PSI) map for alpine permafrost monitoring is examined. The results demonstrate that mean surface velocities are higher in permafrost zones than in zones without permafrost. However, it is not possible to monitor structures and infrastructure in permafrost areas using C-band data.
In summary, the study explores the challenges and potential of using Interferometric
Synthetic Aperture Radar (InSAR) for monitoring ground deformations in civil
engineering, geo-engineering, and natural hazard projects. Technical and nontechnical
obstacles are discussed and recommendations are provided for improving
InSAR’s adoption in practice.
... Read more

In the planning stage of new infrastructure or when designing renovation of existing infrastructure, information about existing slope movements or settlements is essential to make informed design decisions. Interferometric
Synthetic Aperture Radar (InSAR) techniques can be of value to identify these risks in an early stage of a project. InSAR can offer insight into the surface movements of an area from historic archives using satellite-based SAR
data. Furthermore, InSAR observations can help identify zones with displacements larger than the average of an area, and be used to plan future soil investigation more effectively. Thanks to their high temporal and spatial resolution, InSAR observations can also complement in situ conventional monitoring during the construction and operational stage. Despite these possibilities, the use of InSAR is not yet standard practice in geotechnical projects
and no formal guidelines are currently available to inform engineers, planners and infrastructure stakeholder on the use of InSAR-based monitoring within geotechnical design codes. Here we provide an operational framework for the practical integration of InSAR monitoring into current geotechnical design codes, such as Eurocode-7, for all project stages. The proposed framework is then demonstrated for the planning stage of a highway renovation project, focusing on an area potentially subjected to landslides where no conventional monitoring
data was available at this stage. We concluded that the proposed framework is a practical and operational
tool that can be used by planners and engineers in the whole lifecycle of an infrastructure project. ... Read more

This paper investigates the use of InSAR data during shield tunnel construction when short-term settlements occur within a few days. Additionally, the long-term settlement, which occur over several years, in the vicinity of these tunnels are evaluated with inSAR. The North-South Line in Amsterdam is used as a case study for this research. We used the settlement during construction as a-priori information to determine the most likely unwrapping solution for a few selected InSAR points. Then we verified this outcome with the traditional monitoring of the surface levelling points during construction and finally used only the InSAR to evaluate the long-term settlements. We conclude that with prior information InSAR data can be processed correctly and that InSAR can capture the short-term settlement that occur immediately during construction of a shield tunnel. Also, InSAR is a valuable complementary source of information because it provides data outside the area of the levelling points and gives information about settlement patterns prior to and after construction. ... Read more

In this work, we investigate if, when, and how satellite InSAR can be used for evaluating surface settlements that occur during shield tunnelling in soft soil areas. We evaluate the applicability of InSAR prior, during, and after tunnel construction. Special emphasis is placed on the influence of the InSAR phase ambiguities in relation to short-term settlements that may occur during tunnel construction. We demonstrate that a rough analytic settlement prediction can be sufficient to resolve the most probable phase ambiguity level, leading to an augmented implementation of InSAR. We use the shield tunnel of the in North/South Metro Line Amsterdam as a case study, where surface levelling data is available to assess and validate the results. We conclude that InSAR is a valuable complementary source of information as it provides data outside the area of the conventional surveying benchmarks and it reveals relevant information about settlement patterns before and after traditional construction monitoring periods. ... Read more

In 2006 the Betuwe Route including three bored tunnels; was opened. Since then nearly 10 years of operation had passed when in 2015, new construction works in the vicinity of the tunnels was undertaken. During constructions the interaction needed to be evaluated. For that, systematic surveys by laser scanning in the tunnels where performed and additional ring joint rotations were evaluated. It appeared that the soft soil conditions at the Botlek tunnel leads to larger deformations, whereas the design of the rubber sealings at Pannerden is more critical for additional deformations. For the Botlek tunnel the unfavourable situations was Ramps being built in close vicinity of the tunnels, whereas at Pannerden at one cross section clay deposits from an adjacent Stone forging factory need to be relocated and at another location a cross passage needs to be built over the tunnel approach. Characteristic data from both tunnels is shown. ... Read more

De aanhoudende groei van wind- en zonne-energie maakt de vraag naar een duurzaam en betrouwbaar energieopslagsysteem steeds urgenter. In het afstudeeronderzoek van Marius Hendriks (TU Delft, Civiele Techniek) is gekeken naar de potentie van een kleinschalig, duurzaam energieopslagsysteem. Allereerst is onderzocht op welke manier het systeem de meeste energie kan leveren en vervolgens is er een ontwerp gemaakt waarbij dit opslagsysteem wordt toegepast. ... Read more