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Land Monitoring ServiceThe Copernicus Land Monitoring Service is part of the Copernicus Programme, which is an EU Programme implemented by the European Commission (EC) jointly with the European Space Agency (ESA) and the European Environment Agency (EEA). It is aimed at developing a set of European information services based on satellite Earth Observation and in-situ (non-space) data. The other areas of the programme cover Marine Environment Monitoring, Atmosphere Monitoring, Security, Emergency Management and Climate Change.

What is the Copernicus Land Monitoring Service?

The Copernicus Land Monitoring Service provides

geographical information on land cover, land use,

land use change over the years, vegetation state or

the water cycle. Applications that are built upon and

integrate the information supplied by the service can

provide support in areas such as spatial planning,

forest management, water management, agriculture

and food security and emergency management,

amongst others.

Service priorities and their relevance to users are

defined and validated by the EC and the Member

States.

The service became operational in 2012.

What does the Land Monitoring Service do?The three main components of the Copernicus Land

Monitoring Service are currently:

A Global component;

A Pan-European component;

A Local component.

The Global component of the Copernicus Land

Monitoring Service is managed by the European

Commission’s Joint Research Centre. It produces

biophysical parameters on a worldwide scale that

describe the state of vegetation (e.g. leaf area

index, fraction of green vegetation cover, vegetation

condition index), the energy budget (e.g. land surface

temperature) and the water cycle (e.g. soil water

index, water bodies).

The Pan-European component is managed by the

EEA and is producing high resolution information

sets describing the main land cover types: artificial

surfaces (e.g. roads and paved areas), forest areas,

agricultural areas (grasslands), wetlands and small

water bodies.

The Local component of the Copernicus

Land Monitoring Service is also managed by

the EEA. It aims to provide specific and more

detailed information complementing the

information produced by the Pan-European

component. It focuses on “hotspots”

which are prone to specific environmental

challenges like drought or flooding.

The Urban Atlas, one of the local components,

focuses on the mapping and change analysis

of urban areas. It provides reliable, inter-

comparable, high resolution land use

maps for 408 European cities and their

surroundings for the reference years 2006

and 2012 which allow land use comparisons

across cities and over time.

The Urban Atlas is used to detect building

footprints, land use changes, urban sprawl

and urban green area decline and high

urban densities to prioritise public transport,

support emergency planning or promote

sustainable urban development in general in

a pan-European comparable mode.

For example, in the case of mapping

areas affected by emergency situations,

a comparison can be made between the

situation before and after the crisis to

understand if and how this can be prevented

by smart urban planning.

Who can use it and is it for free?The Copernicus data policy promotes the

access, use and sharing of Copernicus

information and data on a full, free and

open basis. There is no restriction on use

or reproduction and redistribution, with or

without adaptation, for commercial or non-

commercial purposes.

This data policy applies to the data and

information generated within the Copernicus

programme, i.e., Sentinel mission data and

Copernicus service information.

Users can find out more about the Copernicus Land Monitoring Service at: http://land.copernicus.eu/

Bruxelles / Brussel

Observing our planet for a safer world

REGIOgis

0 0.75 1.5 Km

0 10 205 Km

Larger Urban Zone: Bruxelles / Brussel Continuous Urban fabric (S.L. > 80%)

Discontinuous Dense Urban Fabric (S.L.: 50% - 80%)

Discontinuous Medium Density Urban Fabric (S.L.: 30% - 50%)

Discontinuous Low Density Urban Fabric (S.L.: 10% - 30%)

Discontinuous Very Low Density Urban Fabric (S.L. < 10%)

Isolated Structures

Industrial, commercial, public, military and private units

Fast transit roads and associated land

Other roads and associated land

Railways and associated land

Port areas

Airports

Mineral extraction and dump sites

Construction sites

Land without current use

Green urban areas

Sports and leisure facilities

Agricultural Areas, semi-natural areas and wetlands

Forests

Water

No data

Urban Atlas map: Brussels

High Resolution Layer Forest Tree cover density

(Brno, CZ)

Corine Land cover (minimum mapping unit 25 ha)

Corine Land Cover: the distribution of aggregated land cover classes

Global Land biophysical parameters: Albedo

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