Shoreline Change Detection in Ghana through Satellite Images

This Omdena Local Chapter Challenge runs for 8 weeks and is a unique experience to try and grow your skills in a collaborative and safe environment with a diverse mix of people from all over the world. 

You will work on solving a local problem, initiated by Accra, Ghana Chapter.

The problem

The situation has gotten so bad that the government has had to step in over the past two decades and put in measures to protect the country’s shoreline. The solution is the construction of various sea defense structures (revetments, breakwaters, etc). However, the average cost to the government for a kilometer of revetment was ~$15m, a simple calculation later and it will cost the country $8.25bn to protect her shores. This is not feasible economically so priorities have been given to large coastal communities and key areas of interest along the coast. The downside to this approach is that without the tacit knowledge of all stakeholders or until significant damage is done, the decision-makers are unable to adequately determine which zones to prioritize first. Having a system in place that can assess the year-on-year shoreline change can better inform decision-makers about the sections of the coast to prioritize.

The goals

• Develop a machine learning model that can extract the shoreline and coastline from a yearly composite satellite image.
• Define a process to assess the year-on-year change in the shoreline. This process should further lead to other goals such as determining the rate of soil erosion on the coast.
• Deploy a web-based dashboard to visualize the shoreline change.

Why join? The uniqueness of Omdena Local Chapter Challenges

Omdena Local Chapter Challenges are not a competition or hackathon but a real-world project that will grow your experience to a new level.

A unique learning experience with the potential to make an impact through the outcome of the project. You will go through an entire data science project lifecycle. This covers problem scoping, data collection, and preparation, as well as modeling for deployment.

And the best part is that you will join the global and collaborative community of Omdena with tons of benefits to accelerate your career.

Read more on how Omdena´s Local Chapters work