Geoland2- Operational Monitoring Services for our Changing Environment

geoland2 intends to constitute a major step forward in the implementation of the GMES Land Monitoring Core Service (LMCS). The three components (Local, Continental and Global) of the LMCS are addressed. The goal of geoland2 is (i) to prepare, validate and demonstrate pre-operational service chains and products that will underpin the LMCS, and (ii) to propose and demonstrate a concrete functional organization of the LMCS. The architecture of geoland2 is made of two different layers, the Core Mapping Services (CMS) and the Core Information Services (CIS). The CMS produce 'basic' land cover, land cover change, and land state products which are of broad generic use and can be directly used for deriving more elaborated products. The CIS are a set of thematic elements that start from CMS products and other data sources to produce 'elaborated' information products addressing specific European policies. The project, which gathers 52 partners from 20 European countries, started in September 2008 for 50 months.