Germany 2019 – Land cover based on Sentinel-2 data
incora Germany Classification 2019: zoom on Cologne-Bonn
incora: Germany 2019 – Land cover based on Sentinel-2 data
Within the project “Inwertsetzung von Copernicus-Daten für die Raumbeobachtung” (incora, BMVI mFund funding reference number: 19F2079C) an automatic procedure was developed to create annual land cover classifications for the whole of Germany. The classifications have a spatial resolution of 10m x 10m (pixel size) and represent the classes built-up area, grassland, forest, agriculture, vegetationless soil and water. They are based on atmospherically corrected Sentinel-2 data (with the MAJA algorithm) which were provided by EOC Geoservice of the German Aerospace Centre (DLR). The training data required for the classification are created rule-based from reference data (e.g. OpenStreetMap) and the Sentinel-2 scenes themselves. Thus, the processing can be flexibly transferred to different years and performed fully automatically.
The incora project focuses on the monitoring of settlement and traffic areas. The comparison of the Germany-wide classifications for different reference years makes it possible to derive small as well as large scale changes in settlement development. In future, the method can be applied over the entire lifetime of the Sentinel-2 satellite mission, so that long-term trends in Germany’s land cover dynamics can be made visible.
We are currently evaluating different options of publishing the data to the public. Stay tuned for updates on this matter or – if you have the urgent need to get access to the data – feel free to reach out.
Your contact person
We are at your disposal:
Guido Riembauer <info@mundialis.de> | phone: +49 (0)228 / 387 580 80
About incora
Within the framework of the sustainability goals, the economical use of land as a resource has been the subject of planning interventions and political measures by the German Government for many years. The conflicting demands for land use require data bases for monitoring settlement and transport area development. The incora project uses the data basis of the Copernicus Sentinel satellites to supplement existing indicators of settlement and transport area development for nationwide area monitoring and to increase the quality and significance of existing indicators. The results will be made publicly available in spatial observation portals.
The project (duration: 12/2018 – 11/2021) is coordinated by the Institut für Landes- und Stadtentwicklungsforschung (ILS), and will be carried out jointly with the Bundesinstitut für Bau-, Stadt- und Raumforschung (BBSR) and mundialis GmbH & Co. KG.
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