EROS is central to the creation of the National Land Cover Database (NLCD), which is updated every five years and stands as the definitive land cover database for the United States.
NLCD is generated in cooperation with the Multi-Resolution Land Characteristics Consortium (MRLC) a partnership of Federal agencies working together to produce current, nationally consistent, land cover products for all 50 states and Puerto Rico.
Click here to learn about NLCD 2019.
NLCD is used for thousands of applications that require information on landcover location or where it is changing.
The latest iteration is NCLD 2019. It contains 28 different land cover products characterizing land cover and land cover change across 8 epochs from 2001-2019, urban imperviousness and urban imperviousness change across 8 epochs, tree canopy and tree canopy change across 2 epochs from 2011-2016 and western U.S. shrub and grassland areas for 2016. Data are available on the MRLC website, either as prepackaged products or custom product areas can be interactively chosen using the MRLC viewer.
NLCD 2019 offers land cover for years 2001, 2003, 2006, 2008, 2011, 2013, 2016, 2019, as well as impervious surface and impervious descriptor layers for each epoch. These products update all previously released versions of landcover and impervious products for CONUS (NLCD 2001, NLCD 2006, NLCD 2011, NLCD 2016) and are not directly comparable to previous products. NLCD 2019 land cover and impervious surface product versions of previous dates must be downloaded for proper comparison.
NLCD also includes an NLCD Land Cover Change Index. This index provides a simple and comprehensive way to visualize change from all 8 dates of land cover in a single layer. The change index was designed to assist NLCD users to understand complex land cover change with a single product.
NLCD's impervious surface descriptor product identifies types of roads, core urban areas, and energy production sites for each impervious pixel to allow deeper analysis of developed features. NLCD 2019 also includes a wind energy layer across all impervious products.
Click here for a podcast on NLCD 2019. Tap the tabs above to explore related science, multimedia, and news on NLCD.
Below are other science projects associated with this project.
Eyes on Earth Episode 54 – National Land Cover Database 2019
Eyes on Earth is a podcast on remote sensing, Earth observation, land change and science, brought to you by the USGS Earth Resources Observation and Science (EROS) Center. In this episode, we learn about the latest land cover release from EROS.
Eyes on Earth Episode 42 – Rangelands of the U.S.
Eyes on Earth is a podcast on remote sensing, Earth observation, land change and science, brought to you by the USGS Earth Resources Observation and Science (EROS) Center. In this episode, we hear how Landsat helps monitor vulnerable rangelands in the Western U.S.
LCMAP and NLCD: Complementary Data for Understanding the Geography of the United States
Eyes on Earth Episode 3 - National Land Cover Database
Eyes on Earth is a podcast on remote sensing, Earth observation, land change and science, brought to you by the USGS Earth Resources Observation and Science (EROS) Center. In this episode, we talk about the National Land Cover Database.
Western U.S. Cheatgrass and Shrubland Monitoring
National Land Cover Database Visualization and Information Tool
Below are data or web applications associated with this project.
National Land Cover Database (NLCD) 2016 Shrubland Fractional Components for the Western U.S. (ver. 3.0, July 2020)
Remote Sensing Shrub/Grass National Land Cover Database (NLCD) Back-in-Time (BIT) Products for the Western U.S., 1985 - 2018
Non-native and synanthropic bird data derived from 2010-2012 Breeding Bird Survey and associated landscape metrics from 2011 NLCD
National Land Cover Database (NLCD)
The National Land Cover Database (NLCD) provides nation-wide data on land cover and land cover change at the Landsat Thematic Mapper (TM) 30-meter resolution. NLCD provides spatial reference and descriptive data for characteristics of the land surface such as thematic class (e.g., urban, agriculture, and forest), percent impervious surface, and percent tree canopy cover.
Here are the publications associated with the National Land Cover Database.
Rangeland fractional components across the western United States from 1985 to 2018
Conterminous United States land cover change patterns 2001–2016 from the 2016 National Land Cover Database
Accuracy assessment of NLCD 2011 impervious cover data for the Chesapeake Bay region, USA
Thematic accuracy assessment of the 2011 National Land Cover Database (NLCD)
Accuracy assessment of NLCD 2006 land cover and impervious surface
National Land Cover Database 2001 (NLCD01) Tree Canopy Layer Tile 4, Southeast United States: CNPY01_4
Thematic accuracy of the NLCD 2001 land cover for the conterminous United States
Comparison of NLCD with NWI Classifications of Baldwin and Mobile Counties, Alabama
Completion of the National Land Cover Database (NLCD) 1992–2001 Land Cover Change Retrofit product
National Land Cover Database 2001 (NLCD01) Tile 4, Southeast United States: NLCD01_4
Below are news stories associated with the National Land Cover Database.
- Overview
EROS is central to the creation of the National Land Cover Database (NLCD), which is updated every five years and stands as the definitive land cover database for the United States.
NLCD helps scientists understand Landsat observations by turning them into pixel-by-pixel maps of specific features. The left frame of the image pair above shows the Dallas, TX area. The right frame shows NLCD's “Impervious Descriptor” data layer - the first and only nationwide, Landsat-scale map of roadways and oil production facilities in the U.S. The image above depicts on-the-ground conditions during the year 2016, but data are also available for 2011, 2006, and 2001.Used separately or in combination with NLCD products like the Urban Imperviousness, the dataset can be used to investigate questions on changes to the Nation’s transportation infrastructure and its impact on the wider ecosystem, wildlife habitat, human health, and more. NLCD is generated in cooperation with the Multi-Resolution Land Characteristics Consortium (MRLC) a partnership of Federal agencies working together to produce current, nationally consistent, land cover products for all 50 states and Puerto Rico.
Click here to learn about NLCD 2019.
NLCD is used for thousands of applications that require information on landcover location or where it is changing.
The latest iteration is NCLD 2019. It contains 28 different land cover products characterizing land cover and land cover change across 8 epochs from 2001-2019, urban imperviousness and urban imperviousness change across 8 epochs, tree canopy and tree canopy change across 2 epochs from 2011-2016 and western U.S. shrub and grassland areas for 2016. Data are available on the MRLC website, either as prepackaged products or custom product areas can be interactively chosen using the MRLC viewer.
NLCD 2019 offers land cover for years 2001, 2003, 2006, 2008, 2011, 2013, 2016, 2019, as well as impervious surface and impervious descriptor layers for each epoch. These products update all previously released versions of landcover and impervious products for CONUS (NLCD 2001, NLCD 2006, NLCD 2011, NLCD 2016) and are not directly comparable to previous products. NLCD 2019 land cover and impervious surface product versions of previous dates must be downloaded for proper comparison.
NLCD also includes an NLCD Land Cover Change Index. This index provides a simple and comprehensive way to visualize change from all 8 dates of land cover in a single layer. The change index was designed to assist NLCD users to understand complex land cover change with a single product.
NLCD's impervious surface descriptor product identifies types of roads, core urban areas, and energy production sites for each impervious pixel to allow deeper analysis of developed features. NLCD 2019 also includes a wind energy layer across all impervious products.
Click here for a podcast on NLCD 2019. Tap the tabs above to explore related science, multimedia, and news on NLCD.
- Science
Below are other science projects associated with this project.
Eyes on Earth Episode 54 – National Land Cover Database 2019
Eyes on Earth is a podcast on remote sensing, Earth observation, land change and science, brought to you by the USGS Earth Resources Observation and Science (EROS) Center. In this episode, we learn about the latest land cover release from EROS.
Eyes on Earth Episode 42 – Rangelands of the U.S.
Eyes on Earth is a podcast on remote sensing, Earth observation, land change and science, brought to you by the USGS Earth Resources Observation and Science (EROS) Center. In this episode, we hear how Landsat helps monitor vulnerable rangelands in the Western U.S.
LCMAP and NLCD: Complementary Data for Understanding the Geography of the United States
Land Change Monitoring, Assessment, and Projection (LCMAP) Collection 1 science products provide unprecedented monitoring of past changes occurring in land cover and condition across the conterminous U.S. over more than 30 years at an annual timestep.Eyes on Earth Episode 3 - National Land Cover Database
Eyes on Earth is a podcast on remote sensing, Earth observation, land change and science, brought to you by the USGS Earth Resources Observation and Science (EROS) Center. In this episode, we talk about the National Land Cover Database.
Western U.S. Cheatgrass and Shrubland Monitoring
The USGS Earth Resources Observation and Science (EROS) Center National Land Cover Database team in collaboration with the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) has produced the most comprehensive remote-sensing based quantification of western United States shrublands to date.National Land Cover Database Visualization and Information Tool
The National Land Cover Database (NLCD) serves as the definitive Landsat-based, 30-meter resolution, land cover database for the Nation. NLCD supports a wide variety of Federal, State, local, and nongovernmental applications that seek to assess ecosystem status and health, understand the spatial patterns of biodiversity, predict effects of climate change, and develop land management policy. Howeve - Data
Below are data or web applications associated with this project.
National Land Cover Database (NLCD) 2016 Shrubland Fractional Components for the Western U.S. (ver. 3.0, July 2020)
Quantifying Western U.S. shrublands as a series of fractional components with remote sensing provides a new way to understand these changing ecosystems. The USGS NLCD team in collaboration with the BLM has produced the most comprehensive remote sensing-based quantification of Western U.S. shrublands to date. Nine shrubland ecosystem components, including percent shrub, sagebrush (Artemisia spp.),Remote Sensing Shrub/Grass National Land Cover Database (NLCD) Back-in-Time (BIT) Products for the Western U.S., 1985 - 2018
The need to monitor change in sagebrush steppe is urgent due to the increasing impacts of climate change, shifting fire regimes, and management practices on ecosystem health. Remote sensing provides a cost-effective and reliable method for monitoring change through time and attributing changes to drivers. We report an automated method of mapping rangeland fractional component cover over a large poNon-native and synanthropic bird data derived from 2010-2012 Breeding Bird Survey and associated landscape metrics from 2011 NLCD
Locations of and proportional abundance of non-native and synanthropic passerines were extracted from Breeding Bird Survey (BBS) data from 2010-2012. Information characterizing the spatial variation and the associated amount, aggregation, and diversity of developed and agricultural land cover types was extracted from the National Land Cover Datasets of 2011. Data supported analyses in the publicatNational Land Cover Database (NLCD)
The National Land Cover Database (NLCD) provides nation-wide data on land cover and land cover change at the Landsat Thematic Mapper (TM) 30-meter resolution. NLCD provides spatial reference and descriptive data for characteristics of the land surface such as thematic class (e.g., urban, agriculture, and forest), percent impervious surface, and percent tree canopy cover.
- Multimedia
- Publications
Here are the publications associated with the National Land Cover Database.
Rangeland fractional components across the western United States from 1985 to 2018
Monitoring temporal dynamics of rangelands to detect and understand change in vegetation cover and composition provides a wealth of information to improve management and sustainability. Remote sensing allows the evaluation of both abrupt and gradual rangeland change at unprecedented spatial and temporal extents. Here, we describe the production of the National Land Cover Database (NLCD) Back in TiConterminous United States land cover change patterns 2001–2016 from the 2016 National Land Cover Database
The 2016 National Land Cover Database (NLCD) product suite (available on www.mrlc.gov), includes Landsat-based, 30 m resolution products over the conterminous (CONUS) United States (U.S.) for land cover, urban imperviousness, and tree, shrub, herbaceous and bare ground fractional percentages. The release of NLCD 2016 provides important new information on land change patterns across CONUS from 2001Accuracy assessment of NLCD 2011 impervious cover data for the Chesapeake Bay region, USA
The National Land Cover Database (NLCD) contains three eras (2001, 2006, 2011) of percentage urban impervious cover (%IC) at the native pixel size (30 m-x-30 m) of the Landsat Thematic Mapper satellite. These data are potentially valuable to environmental managers and stakeholders because of the utility of %IC as an indicator of watershed and aquatic condition, but lack an accuracy assessment becThematic accuracy assessment of the 2011 National Land Cover Database (NLCD)
Accuracy assessment is a standard protocol of National Land Cover Database (NLCD) mapping. Here we report agreement statistics between map and reference labels for NLCD 2011, which includes land cover for ca. 2001, ca. 2006, and ca. 2011. The two main objectives were assessment of agreement between map and reference labels for the three, single-date NLCD land cover products at Level II and Level IAccuracy assessment of NLCD 2006 land cover and impervious surface
Release of NLCD 2006 provides the first wall-to-wall land-cover change database for the conterminous United States from Landsat Thematic Mapper (TM) data. Accuracy assessment of NLCD 2006 focused on four primary products: 2001 land cover, 2006 land cover, land-cover change between 2001 and 2006, and impervious surface change between 2001 and 2006. The accuracy assessment was conducted by selectingNational Land Cover Database 2001 (NLCD01) Tree Canopy Layer Tile 4, Southeast United States: CNPY01_4
This 30-meter resolution data set represents the tree canopy layer for the conterminous United States for the 2001 time period. The data have been arranged into four tiles to facilitate timely display and manipulation within a Geographic Information System, browse graphic: nlcd01-partition.jpg The National Land Cover Data Set for 2001 was produced through a cooperative project conducted by the MulThematic accuracy of the NLCD 2001 land cover for the conterminous United States
The land-cover thematic accuracy of NLCD 2001 was assessed from a probability-sample of 15,000 pixels. Nationwide, NLCD 2001 overall Anderson Level II and Level I accuracies were 78.7% and 85.3%, respectively. By comparison, overall accuracies at Level II and Level I for the NLCD 1992 were 58% and 80%. Forest and cropland were two classes showing substantial improvements in accuracy in NLCD 2001 rComparison of NLCD with NWI Classifications of Baldwin and Mobile Counties, Alabama
An assessment of the accuracy of National Land Cover Data 2001 as compared to National Wetlands Inventory mapping of Mobile and Baldwin Counties conducted by the U.S. Geological Survey's (USGS) National Wetlands Research Center (NWRC). Both classifications were checked against stratified randomly selected ground-based sites and with each other to compare the accuracy of the NLCD with NWI classificCompletion of the National Land Cover Database (NLCD) 1992–2001 Land Cover Change Retrofit product
The Multi-Resolution Land Characteristics Consortium has supported the development of two national digital land cover products: the National Land Cover Dataset (NLCD) 1992 and National Land Cover Database (NLCD) 2001. Substantial differences in imagery, legends, and methods between these two land cover products must be overcome in order to support direct comparison. The NLCD 1992-2001 Land Cover CNational Land Cover Database 2001 (NLCD01) Tile 4, Southeast United States: NLCD01_4
This 30-meter data set represents land use and land cover for the conterminous United States for the 2001 time period. The data have been arranged into four tiles to facilitate timely display and manipulation within a Geographic Information System (see http://water.usgs.gov/GIS/browse/nlcd01-partition.jpg). The National Land Cover Data Set for 2001 was produced through a cooperative project conduc - News
Below are news stories associated with the National Land Cover Database.