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. This metadata refers to the Riparian Zones Land Cover/Land Use (LC/LU) change for 2012-2018. The LC/LU classification is tailored to the needs of biodiversity monitoring in a variable buffer zone of selected rivers (Strahler levels 2-9 derived from EU-Hydro) for the change layer 2012-2018. LC/LU is extracted from Very High Resolution (VHR) satellite data and other available data in a buffer zone of selected rivers for supporting biodiversity monitoring and mapping and assessment of ecosystems and their services. The class definitions follow the pre-defined nomenclature on the basis of Mapping and Assessment of Ecosystems and their Services (MAES) typology of ecosystems (Level 1 to Level 4) and CORINE Land Cover. The classification provides 55 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.

The Start-of-Season Value (SOSV), one of the Vegetation Phenology and Productivity (VPP) parameters, is a product of the pan-European High Resolution Vegetation Phenology and Productivity (HR-VPP) component of the Copernicus Land Monitoring Service (CLMS). The Start-of-Season Value (SOSV) provides the value of the Plant Phenology Index (PPI) at the start of the vegetation growing season. The Plant Phenology Index (PPI) is a physically based vegetation index, developed for improving the monitoring of the vegetation growth cycle. The PPI index values, with 5-day satellite revisit cycle, are first used in a function fitting to derive the PPI Seasonal Trajectories, which is a filtered time series with regular 10-day time step. From these Seasonal Trajectories, a suite of 13 Vegetation Phenology and Productivity (VPP) parameters are then computed and provided, for up to two seasons each year. The Start-of-Season Value is one of the 13 parameters. A complementary quality indicator (QFLAG) provides a confidence level, that is described in table 4 of the same manual. The SOSV dataset is made available as raster files with 10 x 10m resolution, in UTM/WGS84 projection corresponding to the Sentinel-2 tiling grid, for those tiles that cover the EEA38 countries and the United Kingdom and and for two seasons in each year from 2017 onwards. It is updated in the first quarter of each year.

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.

The High Resolution Layer Herbaceous cover (HER) raster product provides a basic land cover classification with 2 thematic classes (temporal and permanent herbaceous / non-herbaceous). The production of the herbaceous layer is primarily based on the probability estimates obtained from the Base Vegetation Layer (BVL) which also serves to harmonize the different vegetated HRL products (Grasslands, Tree Cover and Forests, Croplands). HER is further used as input for the Grassland status layer (GRA) extracting the permanent herbaceous in combination with the Ploughing indicator (PLOUGH). This dataset is provided annually starting in 2017 with 10 meter rasters (fully conformant with the EEA reference grid) in 100 x 100 km tiles covering the EEA38 countries. High Resolution Layer Grasslands product is part of the European Union’s Copernicus Land Monitoring Service. This dataset includes data from the French Overseas Territories (DOMs)

The Rolling Archive database (WLRA) is one of the products of the pan-European High-Resolution Water Snow & Ice portfolio (HR-WSI), which are provided at high spatial resolution from the Sentinel-2 and Sentinel-1 constellations data from September 1, 2016 onwards. The High Resolution Water Layer portfolio consists of the Water Layer (WL), the Water Presence Index (WPI), the Water confidence layer (WCL) and the Rolling archive (WLRA). The WLRA consists of intermediate production layers such as water and wetness masks showing the seasonal water and dry occurrences starting 2009. The masks are used for the generation of the Water Layer which covers a period of seven years per reference year and is regularly updated every three years. It is therefore important that it is consistent over the entire period. To guarantee reproducibility and future continuation of the baseline product, these masks are provided within a database consisting of all seasonal masks starting from 2009. With the new update of the Water product, the HR WL for the reference year 2021 only water masks will be continued. Additionally, the computation frequency changed from seasonal to monthly masks. This update covers a period from 2016.09.01 to 20211231 including an update of the masks already availbe from the historic 2018 production. The binary masks are provided across Europe in a spatial resolution of 10 m x 10 m as GeoTiffs zipped in a ZARR file.

The High Resolution Layer Forest Type (FTY) provides a forest classification with 3 thematic classes (all non-forest areas / broadleaved forest / coniferous forest) at 10m spatial resolution and with a Minimum Mapping Unit (MMU) of 0.5 ha. This raster layer is largely following the FAO (Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations) forest definition with tree covered areas in agricultural and urban context excluded using the respective Forest Additional Support Layer (FADSL). This dataset is provided on a 3-yearly frequency in 10 meter rasters (fully conformant with the EEA reference grid) in 100 x 100 km tiles covering the EEA38 countries. High Resolution Layer Tree Cover and Forest product is part of the European Union’s Copernicus Land Monitoring Service. This dataset includes data from the French Overseas Territories (DOMs)

The High Resolution Layer Cropping Patterns - Secondary Crop Emergence (CPSCE) raster product provides the date of emergence of the cover crop in days of the year (DOY). YYDOY where YY = last 2 digits of the year (e.g. 19 for 2019) and DOY is the day of the year (1-365) This dataset is provided annually starting in 2017 with 10 meter rasters (fully conformant with the EEA reference grid) in 100 x 100 km tiles covering the EEA38 countries. High Resolution Layer Croplands product is part of the European Union’s Copernicus Land Monitoring Service. Confidence layer available for the dataset. This dataset includes data from the French Overseas Territories (DOMs)

This metadata refers to the Copernicus Building Height 2012 third version. The dataset is a 10m high resolution raster layer containing height information generated for selected cities and urban areas in the EEA38 member countries and United Kingdom as part of the Urban atlas suite of products. Height information is based on satellite data and derived datasets like the digital surface model (DSM), the digital terrain model (DTM) and the normalized DSM. The satellite data sources are IRS-P5 stereo images for the capital cities and VHR false stereo pairs extracted from the MAXAR catalogue (WV-01, WV-02, GE-01 and IK) for the remaining areas supplemented by LiDAR data as additional option.

This metadata refers to the Quality Flag (QFLAG2) dataset, one of the near real-time (NRT) Vegetation Index products of the pan-European High Resolution Vegetation Phenology and Productivity (HR-VPP), component of the Copernicus Land Monitoring Service (CLMS). The Quality Flag (QFLAG2) is a quality indicator that assists users with the screening of clouds, shadows from clouds and topography, other dark areas, snow and water surfaces in their analysis of the four related Vegetation Indices datasets: the Plant Phenology Index (PPI), the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI), the Leaf Area Index (LAI) and the Fraction of Absorbed Photosynthetically Active Radiation (FAPAR). The QFLAG2 dataset is made available as raster files with 10 x 10m resolution, in UTM/WGS84 projection corresponding to the Sentinel-2 tiling grid, for those tiles that cover the EEA38 countries and the United Kingdom and for the period from October 2016 until today, with daily updates.

The High Resolution Layer Cropping Patterns - Cropping Seasons Types (CPCSY) raster product provides the number of different crop types grown in a 3-year period [0-3] (excluding cover crops). This dataset is provided annually starting in 2017 with 10 meter rasters (fully conformant with the EEA reference grid) in 100 x 100 km tiles covering the EEA38 countries. High Resolution Layer Croplands product is part of the European Union’s Copernicus Land Monitoring Service. This dataset includes data from the French Overseas Territories (DOMs)