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Riparian zones represent transitional areas occurring between land and freshwater ecosystems, characterised by distinctive hydrology, soil and biotic conditions and strongly influenced by the stream water. They provide a wide range of riparian functions (e.g. chemical filtration, flood control, bank stabilization, aquatic life and riparian wildlife support, etc.) and ecosystem services. The Riparian Zones products support the objectives of several European legal acts and policy initiatives, such as the EU Biodiversity Strategy to 2020, the Habitats and Birds Directives and the Water Framework Directive. Green Linear Elements (GLE) are ecologically significant, structural landscape elements which act as important dispersion vectors of biodiversity. GLEs comprise hedgerows and lines of trees and offer a wide range of ecosystem services: they are linked to both landscape richness and fragmentation of habitats, with a direct potential for restoration, and contribute also to hazard protection. Green linear elements form part of the Green Infrastructure and are specifically addressed in the EU Biodiversity Strategy 2020. The GLE product provides reliable and detailed geospatial information on the occurrence and spatial distribution of: Small linear vegetation features such as hedgerows, scrub and tree rows with a minimum length of 100m and a width of up to 10m; Isolated patches of trees and scrub with a size between 500 m² and 0.5 ha. Green linear elements including trees and hedgerows with 100m minimum length and 500 m² Minimum Mapping Unit (MMU)
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Riparian zones represent transitional areas occurring between land and freshwater ecosystems, characterised by distinctive hydrology, soil and biotic conditions and strongly influenced by the stream water. They provide a wide range of riparian functions (e.g. chemical filtration, flood control, bank stabilization, aquatic life and riparian wildlife support, etc.) and ecosystem services. The Riparian Zones products will support the objectives of several European legal acts and policy initiatives, such as the EU Biodiversity Strategy to 2020, the Habitats and Birds Directives and the Water Framework Directive. Land Cover/Land Use (LC/LU) classification is tailored to the needs of biodiversity monitoring in a tailored buffer zone along large and medium-sized European rivers (with Strahler levels 3-8 derived from EU-Hydro). LC/LU is extracted from VHR satellite data and other available data in a buffer zone of selected rivers. The classes follow the pre-defined nomenclature on the basis of MAES typology of ecosystems (Level 1 to Level 4) and Corine Land Cover, providing 80 distinct thematic classes with a Minimum Mapping Unit (MMU) of 0.5 ha and a Minimum Mapping Width (MMW) of 10 m. The production of the Riparian Zones products was coordinated by the European Environment Agency in the frame of the EU Copernicus programme.
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The high resolution imperviousness products capture the percentage and change of soil sealing. Built-up areas are characterized by the substitution of the original (semi-) natural land cover or water surface with an artificial, often impervious cover. These artificial surfaces are usually maintained over long periods of time. A series of high resolution imperviousness datasets (for the 2006, 2009, 2012 and 2015 reference years) with all artificially sealed areas was produced using automatic derivation based on calibrated Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI). This series of imperviousness layers constitutes the main status layers. They are per-pixel estimates of impermeable cover of soil (soil sealing) and are mapped as the degree of imperviousness (0-100%). Imperviousness change layers were produced as a difference between the reference years (2006-2009, 2009-2012, 2012-2015 and additionally 2006-2012, to fully match the CORINE Land Cover production cycle) and are presented 1) as degree of imperviousness change (-100% -- +100%), in 20m and 100m pixel size, and 2) a classified (categorical) 20m change product. The production of the High Resolution Imperviousness products was coordinated by the European Environment Agency in the frame of the EU Copernicus programme. A verification of the Imperviousness layer was performed by the Institute of Nature Research during autumn of 2018 and the data and resulting report are made available on the NLSI websites.
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The Earth’s surface is in constant motion. Whether due to natural phenomena such as tectonic activity or volcanism, or because of human activities such as groundwater extraction or mining, the dynamism of the surface can have significant impacts on infrastructure and natural ecosystems. In recent years, increasing awareness of the potential risks related to ground motion has led to a demand for comprehensive and reliable information on these movements. The European Ground Motion Service (EGMS) was created in response to user needs voiced at the Copernicus User Forum. This product represents the bleeding edge of space-based remote sensing technology, using Synthetic Aperture Radar Interferometry (InSAR) data derived from Sentinel-1 to detect and measure ground movements across Europe with milimetre precision. The product is updated annually and can be used for a variety of applications; city, regional, or state authorities can use it to monitor the structural integrities of dams, bridges, railways, and buildings. It allows urban planners to make data-driven decisions about where to build new infrastructure by assessing the likelihood of natural hazards such as landslides or subsidence. Researchers can also use EGMS data to study the impacts of climate change, such as thawing permafrost and coastal subsidence. More info here: https://land.copernicus.eu/en/products/european-ground-motion-service https://sdi.eea.europa.eu/catalogue/srv/eng/catalog.search#/metadata/943e9cbb-f8ef-4378-966c-63eb761016a9 The EGMS Ortho exploits the information provided by ascending and descending orbits of the EGMS Calibrated to derive two further layers; one of purely vertical displacements (EGMS Ortho Vertical), the other of purely east-west displacements (EGMS Ortho East/West). Both layers are resampled to a 100 m grid, so that the final resolution is 100 by 100 m. This dataset is processed from the Copernicus EGMS vector dataset resulting in a raster mosaic of the mean velocity of the ground in Iceland between 2018 and 2022 in mm/year in the up and down direction and the east west direction. It has been reprojected to EPSG:3057 from EPSG:3035.
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The European Urban Atlas provides reliable, inter-comparable, high-resolution land use and land cover data for 800 Functional Urban Area (FUA) for the 2012 reference year in EEA39 countries. The spatial data can be downloaded together with a map for each FUA covered and a report with the metadata for the respective area. Additional information (product description, mapping guidance and class description) can be found here: https://land.copernicus.eu/user-corner/technical-library/urban-atlas-2012-mapping-guide-new Commission Directorate-General for Regional and Urban Policy and the Directorate-General for Enterprise and Industry in the frame of the EU Copernicus programme, with the support of the European Space Agency and the European Environment Agency.
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The main high resolution grassland product is the Grassland layer, a grassland/non-grassland mask for the EEA39 area. This grassy and non-woody vegetation baseline product includes all kinds of grasslands: managed grassland, semi-natural grassland and natural grassy vegetation. It is a binary status layer mapping grassland and all non-grassland areas in 20m and (aggregated) 100m pixel size. Two additional (expert) products complete the high resolution grassland product: the Ploughing Indicator (PLOUGH) and the Grassland Vegetation Probability Index (GRAVPI). While the PLOUGH concentrates on historic land cover features with the aim to indicate ploughing activities in preceding years, the GRAVPI provides a measure of classification reliability. GRAVPI is a 20m pixel size product, mapping on a range of 1-100 the class probability. PLOUGH is a 20m pixel size additional product, mapping from 1-6 the number of years since the last indication of ploughing. A verification of the Grassland layer was performed by the Institute of Nature Research during autumn of 2018 and the data and resulting report are made available on the NLSI websites.
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The high resolution forest product consists of three types of (status) products and additional change products. The status products are available for the 2012 and 2015 reference years: 1. Tree cover density providing level of tree cover density in a range from 0-100% 2. Dominant leaf type providing information on the dominant leaf type: broadleaved or coniferous 3. A Forest type product. The forest type product allows to get as close as possible to the FAO forest definition. In its original (20m) resolution it consists of two products: 1) a dominant leaf type product that has a MMU of 0.5 ha, as well as a 30% tree cover density threshold applied, and 2) a support layer that maps, based on the dominant leaf type product, trees under agricultural use and in urban context (derived from CLC and high resolution imperviousness 2009 data). For the final 100m product trees under agricultural use and urban context from the support layer are removed. The high resolution forest change products comprise a simple tree cover density change product for 2012-2015 (% increase or decrease of real tree cover density changes). A verification of the Dominant Leaf Type layer was performed by the Institute of Nature Research during autumn of 2018 and the data and resulting report are made available on the NLSI websites.
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The Urban Atlas provides pan-European comparable land use and land cover data for Functional Urban Areas (FUA). The Street Tree Layer (STL) is a separate layer from the Urban Atlas 2012 LU/LC layer produced within the level 1 urban mask for each FUA. It includes contiguous rows or a patches of trees covering 500 m² or more and with a minimum width of 10 meter over "Artificial surfaces" (nomenclature class 1) inside FUA (i.e. rows of trees along the road network outside urban areas or forest adjacent to urban areas should not be included). Urban Atlas is a joint initiative of the European Commission Directorate-General for Regional and Urban Policy and the Directorate-General for Enterprise and Industry in the frame of the EU Copernicus programme, with the support of the European Space Agency and the European Environment Agency.
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The combined Water and Wetness product is a thematic product showing the occurrence of water and wet surfaces over the period from 2009 to 2015. Two products are available: o The main Water and Wetness (WAW) product with defined classes of (1) permanent water, (2) temporary water, (3) permanent wetness and (4) temporary wetness. o The additional expert product: Water & Wetness Probability Index (WWPI) The products show the occurrence of water and indicate the degree of wetness in a physical sense, assessed independently of the actual vegetation cover and are thus not limited to a specific land cover class and their relative frequencies. A verification of the Water and Wetness layer was performed by the Institute of Nature Research during autumn of 2018 and the data and resulting report are made available on the NLSI websites.
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The high resolution forest product consists of three types of (status) products and additional change products. The status products are available for the 2012 and 2015 reference years: 1. Tree cover density providing level of tree cover density in a range from 0-100% 2. Dominant leaf type providing information on the dominant leaf type: broadleaved or coniferous 3. A Forest type product. The forest type product allows to get as close as possible to the FAO forest definition. In its original (20m) resolution it consists of two products: 1) a dominant leaf type product that has a MMU of 0.5 ha, as well as a 30% tree cover density threshold applied, and 2) a support layer that maps, based on the dominant leaf type product, trees under agricultural use and in urban context (derived from CLC and high resolution imperviousness 2009 data). For the final 100m product trees under agricultural use and urban context from the support layer are removed. The high resolution forest change products comprise a simple tree cover density change product for 2012-2015 (% increase or decrease of real tree cover density changes). A verification of the Tree Cover Density layer was performed by the Institute of Nature Research during autumn of 2018 and the data and resulting report are made available on the NLSI websites.