Can I cite second hand information from series of sentences

Question

I would like to cite a series of concept. For example, in this paper, the authors wrote:

The identification of prospective geothermal systems in the aseismic geologic setting is very challenging and costly using conventional techniques. The applicability of remote sensing imagery to detect spatial patterns of hydrothermal alteration minerals and thermal anomaly provides a cost-effective and useful technique for mapping geothermal features in underdeveloped countries (Kratt et al., 2010, van der Meer et al., 2014, Calvin et al., 2015, Calvin and Pace, 2016, Abubakar et al., 2017a, Abubakar et al., 2017b, Abubakar et al., 2017c, Abubakar et al., 2017a, Abubakar et al., 2017b, Abubakar et al., 2017c). Spectral remote sensing imagery produces digital images that can be used for interpretation of surface compositional features such as hydrothermally altered mineral assemblages. These minerals manifest unique spectral signatures that can be detected using remote sensing sensors (Iqbal et al., 2018, Pour et al., 2017a, Pour et al., 2017b, Pour et al., 2017a, Pour et al., 2017b, Testa et al., 2018, Ahmadirouhani et al., 2018). Iron oxide/hydroxides and hydroxyl-bearing mineral groups are by-products of metasomatism in hydrothermal systems, which serve as one of the most important indicators for mapping geothermal sites (Carranza et al., 2008, Renaut et al., 2017, van der Meer et al., 2018).

I'd like to cite the series of concept like this:

Identifying prospective geothermal sites poses significant challenges and costs when using conventional techniques (Abubakar et al., 2019). Remote sensing offers cost-effective and valuable method for identifying spatial patterns of altered minerals. It can be used to detect hydrothermally altered mineral assemblages which manifest unique spectral signatures and are important indicators for mapping geothermal sites.

Is there something wrong of directly citing them for the series of ideas instead of going through their original sources?

Answer 1

It is better to cite some original research or at least a review paper. There are several questions on this site where people explain why this is. See below for links.

One problem is that when you don't read the original source but just cite something that cites something else, it sometimes happens that the claim is wrong and never appeared in the original source. See Academic urban legends.

In this case I don't think you need to read all the original sources that are cited, but just a few of them.

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Answer 2

This is a judgement call. As a reader or reviewer I would probably be happy enough with "(Abubakar et al., 2019)" alone, but you could hedge your bets with "(see Abubakar et al., 2019 for discussion and references)" to indicate that the reference only supports the statement indirectly.

On second thought, though, reading the paragraph you quote, the only part that supports your statement is the first sentence ("The identification of prospective geothermal systems in the aseismic geologic setting is very challenging and costly using conventional techniques"), which seems to be asserted without support or further discussion. The rest of the paragraph seems to be about unconventional techniques, as far as I can tell without much context. Do you have a better reference you can cite for the significant costs and challenges of conventional methods?