Exploring the feasibility of applying the Land Use Modelling Platform outside the EU. Preliminary estimates of the global demand for urban land

This technical note aims to present the progresses done towards the evaluation of the possible application of the Land Use Modelling Platform in a global context or anyhow outside the geographical borders of Europe. The definition and computation of demands for land-uses are the first element to be appraised since are essential inputs for the modelling platform. The note describes the methodology adopted to compute the demand for urban land (this includes land uses related to residences, leisure facilities and small commercial and industrial activities) in 10 region worldwide according to a set of different scenarios of demographic exspansion.JRC.H.8-Sustainability Assessmen

Estimating Demand for Industrial and Commercial Land Use Given Economic Forecasts

Current developments in the field of land use modelling point towards greater level of spatial and thematic resolution and the possibility to model large geographical extents. Improvements are taking place as computational capabilities increase and socioeconomic and environmental data are produced with sufficient detail. Integrated approaches to land use modelling rely on the development of interfaces with specialized models from fields like economy, hydrology, and agriculture. Impact assessment of scenarios/policies at various geographical scales can particularly benefit from these advances. A comprehensive land use modelling framework includes necessarily both the estimation of the quantity and the spatial allocation of land uses within a given timeframe. In this paper, we seek to establish straightforward methods to estimate demand for industrial and commercial land uses that can be used in the context of land use modelling, in particular for applications at continental scale, where the unavailability of data is often a major constraint. We propose a set of approaches based on ‘land use intensity’ measures indicating the amount of economic output per existing areal unit of land use. A base model was designed to estimate land demand based on regional-specific land use intensities; in addition, variants accounting for sectorial differences in land use intensity were introduced.JRC.H.8-Sustainability Assessmen

Population estimation for the Urban Atlas Polygons

The aim of this technical note is to describe the methodology and source data used to estimate the residential population in each built-up polygon of the Urban Atlas land use/cover dataset. The final outcome of the procedure is a new attribute to the Urban Atlas polygons that will broaden the range of uses of the Urban Atlas dataset, contributing to new analysis and assessments in different thematic fields, e.g. urban quality of life (accessibility to recreational areas; exposure to sources of noise); urban morphology (population density gradients).JRC.H.8-Sustainability Assessmen

Generating density grids of services and utilities in Europe based on Point of Interest (POI) data

In this short technical note we describe the production of a set of density maps of facilities and utilities across Europe. This dataset consists of 24 raster grids layers of 500x500 metres with each 500 m2 cell representing the number of Points of Interest (POI) per category, for the 2016 reference year, hereinafter referred as ‘POI density grids’. The work has been carried out in the frame of the Knowledge Centre for Territorial Policies. This dataset was produced in April 2018 in the scope of the collaboration between DG JRC and International Transport Forum (ITF) at the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). It acts as a think tank for global transport policy issues and organises an annual summit of transport ministers. This work outputs will support the analysis of the spatial structure of regions and cities in terms of the supply of key urban services and amenities and will feed into the LUISA Territorial Modelling Platform. In the next section are described the used datasets and the methods deriving the final density grids. Chapter 3 analysis the output results both thematically and spatially, focusing on Paris as example. The conclusions are presented on the final chapter just before the annexes where detailed statistics can be found.JRC.B.3-Territorial Developmen

Processos de expansão urbana e mudanças na paisagem: ensaio metodológico (1950-2000)

A segunda metade do século XX conheceu um fenómeno de expansão das áreas edificadas por quase todo o Mundo. Em Portugal, este fenómeno observou-se com particular incidência na faixa litoral e em torno das duas principais cidades portuguesas, Lisboa e Porto. O crescimento económico e demográfico conduziu à expansão da mancha edificada, e esta potenciou o desenvolvimento de extensos contínuos urbanizados que contribuíram para a consolidação das áreas metropolitanas, e determinou fortes mudanças na paisagem. Aprofundar o conhecimento sobre os processos de urbanização recentes é de interesse para as ciências geográficas, mas também para disciplinas aplicadas como o planeamento territorial. Desde o seu surgimento, os Sistemas de Informação Geográfica (SIG) e as ferramentas de cartografia automática têm aberto novos horizontes para a Cartografia, com potencialidades que devem ser aproveitadas também no estudo das paisagens e, em particular, do crescimento urbano. Do ponto de vista morfológico, o estudo da expansão urbana não pode deixar de se apoiar em cartografia multi-temporal. Mais do que sucessivos retratos estáticos, a cartografia multi-temporal permite construir uma imagem dinâmica do processo, apoiando subsequentes estudos explicativos. Em Portugal, o que se tem produzido sobre expansão urbana ou está limitado pela reduzida escala ou pela reduzida extensão (estudo de áreas restritas ou de cidades isoladamente). Cada vez mais adoptadas, as técnicas baseadas em classificação e/ou interpretação de imagens de satélite permitem produzir cartografia multi-temporal de escala e extensão bastante maiores. Todavia, estas técnicas estão limitadas pelo seu recente surgimento: cartografar o espaço edificado em períodos anteriores à década de 1980 não é possível. As limitações conhecidas para a produção de cartografia urbana multi-temporal para escalas regionais e sub-regionais podem ser diminuídas através de uma abordagem que recorra à integração em SIG de informação contida em edições antigas de cartografia topográfica, permitindo cartografar o processo de crescimento urbano para um determinado intervalo de tempo. Neste trabalho, esta abordagem foi seguida para preparar uma base cartográfica multi-temporal do edificado, com três momentos que cobrem a segunda metade do século XX. Estas bases permitiram ainda a produção de um conjunto de indicadores "morfo-densimétricos" relativos às áreas edificadas, para os três momentos temporais, possibilitando análises sobre os ritmos e as formas de urbanização recente na área de estudo (metrópole do Porto). Crê-se que a abordagem proposta permite abrir novas perspectivas para a produção cartográfica, o estudo e a compreensão dos processos recentes de urbanização e das suas implicações nas dinâmicas da paisagem.The second half of the 20th century witnessed the rapid expansion of built-up areas practically all over the world. In Portugal, this phenomenon took place particularly along the coastal strip and around its two main cities, Lisbon and Porto. Economic and demographic growth led to processes of urban expansion, which in turn bolstered the development of extensive urbanized continuums, contributing to the consolidation of the metropolitan areas and transformation of landscapes. Greater knowledge of the recent processes of urbanization is of interest to the geographical sciences, as well as to applied fields such as spatial planning. Since their initial development, Geographical Information Systems (GIS) and automatic mapping tools have opened new horizons in Cartography, with a potential which should be taken advantage also in the study of landscapes and, particularly, of urban growth. From a morphological point of view, a study of urban expansion necessarily has to be based on multitemporal mapping. More than successive static pictures, multitemporal mapping produces a dynamic image of the process, providing support to ensuing explanatory studies. In Portugal, the studies on urban expansion are limited either by the reduced scale employed or by their reduced focus (studies of small areas or single cities). Increasingly in use, techniques based on the classification and/or interpretation of satellite images produce multitemporal cartography at much larger scale and coverage. However, these techniques have limitations, given their recent development: it is not possible to map built-up areas prior to 1980. The limitations in producing multitemporal urban cartography at regional and sub-regional scales could be mitigated by an approach integrating information from old editions of topographic mapping in a GIS, which could thus track the process of urban growth for a certain time frame. In this paper, this approach was employed to prepare a multitemporal cartographic database of built areas, with three moments comprising the second half of the 20th century. These databases also served to produce a set of "morpho-densimetric" indicators related to built-up areas, for the three temporal moments, leading to analyses on the pace and forms of recent urbanization in the area under study (the Porto metropolis). We believe that the approach proposed can open new perspectives for cartographic production, as well as for the study and understanding of recent urbanization processes and its implications on the landscape dynamics

Resilience of large investments and critical infrastructures in Europe to climate change

This technical report describes the key findings, methodological aspects and underlying assumptions and limitations of the research activities undertaken by the JRC in the CCMFF project financed by DG CLIMA. The project provides the first comprehensive multi-hazard multi-sector risk assessment for Europe under climate change and identifies the most vulnerable and impacted regions in Europe throughout the 21st century. It significantly contributes to a better understanding and awareness of hazard impacts that is crucial for the management of future climate risks.JRC.H.7-Climate Risk Managemen

Configuration of a reference scenario for the land use modelling platform

The definition of the Reference Scenario, given in the Energy Trends to 2030 publication by DG ENER (2009 update ), assumes full implementation of the Climate and Energy package. The legislation included within the Climate and Energy Package is reflective of the legally binding targets to ensure that the EU meets its climate and energy targets for 2020. This scenario assumes that national targets under the Renewables directive (2009/28/EC) and the GHG Effort-sharing decision (2009/406/EC) are achieved. The Reference scenario is one of three energy trends scenarios, used so far for the Energy 2050 Roadmap Impact assessment . The scenarios are derived with the PRIMES model by a consortium led by the National Technical University of Athens (E3MLab). The PRIMES model is key to the definition of the scenarios because of its energy focus. The Reference Scenario itself is derived within PRIMES and is supported by other specialised models downstream. The purpose of this document is to describe how the LUMP was configured in order to be consistent with the PRIMES and other upstream models within the integrated modelling chain, including the incorporation of the legally binding objectives, directives and guidelines. In order to be coherent with the IA accompanying the Communication on the Energy Roadmap 2050, new policies adopted up until March 2010 were implemented in so far as possible. The implementation has not yet been finalized and this document will be refreshed and re-distributed in its final form once the Reference Scenario has been fully configured.JRC.H.8-Sustainability Assessmen

Land allocation and suitability analysis for the production of food, feed and energy crops in the period 2010 - 2050 EU Reference Scenario 2013 LUISA platform – Updated Configuration 2014

Since land is a finite resource, the competition for land among different uses has become a real problem. Competition for land takes place when different alternative uses (such as agriculture, forestry, energy or/and natural conservation) are competing for the same piece of land. When the competition for land is highly intense in a given territory, a specific land use/cover might cause the displacement of another one, leading to land-use conversion and, potential negative environmental, economic and social impacts. In the long term, this exacerbated competition might increase the pressure on the land and the impacts on the land capacity to support ecosystems and productive systems. Methodologies and tools to assess the potential impacts of bioenergy development in the EU on land uses and functions provide useful insight to shed light on the environmental impacts of energy policies. The territorial assessment carried out by the Land Use-based Sustainability Assessment (LUISA) modelling platform highlights where in Europe the current macro-economic trends and energy policy targets might pose a threat to our land resources in the mid to long term. This might happen, for instance, in regions where the demand for energy crops and the need for residential and industry/commerce/services functions, is forecasted to increase. Essential land uses, such as agriculture for food and feed production, could therefore be transferred to less suitable lands at a regional or local scale. The herein report explores in detail the land uses that are expected to be in direct competition for land (food, feed and energy) as a result of the EU bioenergy targets and considering the suitability characteristics of the land for these uses. The analysis is carried out per main crop group (cereals, maize, root crops, other arable crops and energy crops), as simulated by the LUISA modelling platform. The results presented highlight where and how the displacement of food and feed crops from highly suitable land to lower levels of suitability can be caused by different drivers, among which the expansion of built-up areas and dedicated energy crops. In summary, the majority of cereal, maize and root crops in Europe are allocated on land classified as highly suitable (according to local biophysical conditions, possible fertiliser input and current cropping patterns) between 2020 and 2050. However, the amount of land cultivated with food crops (cereal, maize and root crop production) is shown to experience a substantial decrease in the majority of the MSs, on average higher than 10% across the entire simulation period. On the opposite, energy crop production increases at fast pace, at times doubling the amount of allocated land from the year 2020, when they first appears in the modelling, to 2050. Due to the growth of residential and ICS (industry, commercial and services) sites, land highly suitable for the cultivation of food crops and non-food crops is increasingly being used for artificial uses. In general terms, growing crops on highly suitable land results in a cost reduction associated to inputs use, such as fertilizers, pesticides and water. However, as result of the competition, there is – in several areas in Europa - an increasing shift towards low quality land for growing food and feed crops, with environmental and economic impacts to be carefully evaluated.JRC.H.8-Sustainability Assessmen