Data Visualization
25 Mar 2020
Data Visualization
25 Mar 2020
Indicator Assessment
25 Mar 2020
For the reference year 2015 , 85 861 km 2 of the total area covered by the EEA-39 countries were mapped and categorised as 'sealed surface' in the Copernicus imperviousness product. This corresponds to 1.466 % of the total EEA-39 area.
Between 2006 and 2015, soil sealing (imperviousness) in all EEA-39 countries increased by a total of 3 859 km2 , an annual average increase of 429 km 2 . During this period, the average annual increase in soil sealing relative to country area varied from 0 % to 0.088 %.
In 2015, the percentage of a countries' total area that was sealed also varied greatly, with values ranging from 16.17 % (Malta) to 0.07 % (Iceland). The highest sealing values, as a percentage of country area, occurred in small countries with high population densities, while the lowest sealing values can be found in large countries with low population densities.
The average annual increase in sealing was 460 km 2 between 2006-2009, increasing to 492 km 2 for the 2009-2012 period and slowing to 334 km 2 for the 2012-2015 period. The slow-down in the sealing increase between the two reference periods occurred in 31 out of 39 countries. The same trend is visible for sealing figures normalised by the size of the country (the % of the country newly sealed on average annually for the three periods).
The most problematic situation occurs in countries where there is already a high percentage of sealing and where the annual rate of increase relative to country area is high. Even more problematic are situations where, for 2012-2015, the rate of sealing increase is accelerating, in contrast to the general trend of a slowing rate of increase.
The map shows the percentage of the average annual change in soil sealing for each of the rectangular 10 km x 10 km grid cells, over the 2006-2015 period
The map shows the density of soil sealing in 2012, based on a 10 km2 reference grid. Green and light orange colors show areas with no or very limited sealing, while red and dark red colors show highly to fully sealed grid cells (mainly urban areas).
The chart shows the vegetation productivity changes (%) over areas with land use change in the period 2000-2018. The values are broken down by major land use change drivers.
The chart shows the effect of temperature variations on vegetation productivity, expressed in standard deviation units of vegetation productivity.
Many global policy frameworks, including the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs),directly and indirectly address land and soil. Many of these SGDs cannot be achieved without healthysoils and a sustainable land use. Below is an overview of the SDGs with strong links to soil.
Indicator Assessment
13 Dec 2019
In 2015, on average, there were around 1.5 fragmented landscape elements per km 2 in the European Union [1] , a 3.7 % increase compared with 2009.
Approximately 1.13 million km 2 , around 28 % of the area of the EU [1] , was strongly fragmented i n 2015 , a 0.7 % increase compared with 2009.
There was less of an increase in fragmented landscape elements and in the area of strongly fragmented landscape between 2012 and 2015 than between 2009 and 2012 (1.4 and 0.18 percentage points, respectively).
Arable lands and permanent croplands (around 42 .6 %) and pastures and farmland mosaics (around 40.2 %) were most affected by strong fragmentation pressure in 2015 in the EU. Between 2009 and 2015, however, the largest increase in the area of strongly fragmented landscape was in grasslands/pastures and in farmland mosaics.
Luxembourg (91 %), Belgium (83 %) and Malta (70 %) had the largest proportions of strongly fragmented landscape in 2015 (as a proportion of their country area). The Baltic countries and Finland and Sweden were on average the least fragmented countries in the EU.
Between 2009 and 2015, the area of strongly fragmented landscape increased most in Croatia, as well as in Greece, Hungary and Poland.
[1] Romania is excluded because of the poor coverage of fragmentation geometry data in 2009.
Soil plays a crucial role in nature’s cycles, including the nutrient cycle, which involves how much soil organic matter — i.e. carbon, nitrogen and phosphorus — is taken up and stored in soil. Organic compounds, such as leaves and root tips, are broken down to simpler compounds by organisms living in soil before they can be used by plants. Some soil bacteria convert atmospheric nitrogen into mineral nitrogen, which is essential for plant growth. Fertilisers introduce nitrogen and phosphates to induce plant growth but not all amounts are taken up by plants. The excess can enter rivers and lakes and affect life in these water ecosystems.
GIS Map Application
15 Aug 2019
The intensity of land take is calculated as land take in the given period as a percentage of the area of artificial surfaces in 2000. For easier comparability, land take is summarised within NUTS3 regions.
The raster file is the basis of the indicator for assessing landscape fragmentation due to urban and transport expansion. The computation is based on the method of Effective Mesh Density (seff). The Effective Mesh Density (seff) is a measure of landscape fragmentation, i.e. the degree to which movement between different parts of the landscape is interrupted by a Fragmentation Geometry (FG). FGs are defined as the presence of impervious surfaces and traffic infrastructure. The Effective Mesh Density gives the effective number of meshes (or landscape patches) per 1000 km2, in other words, the density of the meshes. The more FGs fragment the landscape, the higher the effective mesh density. The seff values are reported within the 1km sq regular LEAC grid.
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.
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