Posted on May 22, 2026
By Maria Heloisa Barbosa Borges
The beach of Itapoá, in the Northern Coast of Santa Catarina, is being scanned by a laser sensor capable of measuring every centimeter of sand the city gains or loses as the seasons change. The equipment uses LiDAR technology, an acronym in English for light detection and ranging, and flies over the shoreline in aerial surveys that produce three-dimensional maps of the sand strip with unprecedented precision for the Santa Catarina coast. The project was established in April between the Geological Service of Brazil, the Federal University of Paraná, and the city government of Itapoá as part of the national Coastal Dynamics program, which has already delivered results in São Vicente, São Paulo, and conducts studies in Maricá, Rio de Janeiro, and Guaratuba, Paraná.
The beach monitoring happens at a unique moment: Itapoá has been facing coastal erosion for decades and is executing the largest sand strip widening ever done in Brazil, with an investment of R$ 336 million and a forecast to deposit 6.4 million cubic meters of sand over the shoreline, three times more than the volume used in the famous widening of Balneário Camboriú. The work was already 58.5% completed at the beginning of 2026, with 5 kilometers expanded and 3.4 million cubic meters deposited. But widening the beach without understanding the dynamics of the sea is like filling a leaky bucket. This is exactly what LiDAR aims to solve.
LiDAR is an optical sensor that emits laser pulses towards the ground and measures the time each pulse takes to return. With millions of points collected per second, the equipment creates an extremely detailed three-dimensional model of the surface. In the aerial surveys of Itapoá, the sensor is attached to an aircraft that travels along the shoreline from Pontal to Barra do Saí, producing what researchers describe as a true x-ray of the beach.
