Assessing inland water resources variability by using satellite data: Case study of the Serra del Corvo artificial Lake in Italy

Binh Pham-Duc¹, Raffaele Albano², Meriam Lahsaini³, Beniamino Onorati⁴ & Teodosio Lacava^5
1REMOSAT, University of Science and Technology of Hanoi, Vietnam Academy of Science and Technology, Hanoi, Vietnam.
²University of Basilicata, Health Science Department, 85100 Potenza (PZ), Italy.
³ARCADIA Geographical Information System srl, 27029 Vigevano (PV), Italy.
⁴University of Basilicata, Engineering Department, 85100 Potenza (PZ), Italy.
5 Institute of Methodologies for Environmental Monitoring (IMAA), National Research Council (CNR), 85050 Tito Scalo (PZ), Italy.
Corresponding author e-mail: teodosio.lacava@cnr.it

Satellite data provide valuable information on the variations in the surface area of inland waters. These observations are crucial for monitoring remote or poorly instrumented regions and offer complementary insights to in situ measurements. To further assess this capability, we analyzed the temporal variations of Serra del Corvo Lake – located at the border between the Basilicata and Puglia regions in southern Italy – using cloud-free Sentinel-2 imagery acquired from 2015 to 2025. The satellite-derived surface water extent time series were compared with daily in situ measurements of water volume and level, achieving very high correlation (R > 0.98). This strong correlation supported the development of two predictive models, based on both linear and exponential regression method, which demonstrated satisfactory accuracy (R² consistently above 0.8 in both calibration and validation phases). These results highlight the high potential of satellitebased approaches to provide almost independent and reliable information on inland water dynamics.

remote sensing, Sentinel-2, inland water, water resources management, Basilicata region.