Remote sensing supports the definition of the water quality status of Lake Omodeo (Italy)

Lake Omodeo is the largest artificial reservoir of Sardinia and its waters are a valuable resource for irrigation, domestic and industrial purposes. Lake Omodeo has serious problems of eutrophication. Since 2007 the local water authority has been undertaken a monitoring program designed to test an integrated methodology based on field measurements and remote sensing. This study illustrates the production of multitemporal spatialised maps of chlorophyll-a concentrations from satellite data acquired from Medium Resolution Imaging Spectrometer (MERIS). The analysis confirmed the eutrophic status of Omodeo, especially between spring and summer (mainly due to cyanobacteria bloom) assessing their dependency on weather conditions and river inputs.