Upcoming 10/24 webinar on “The New Annual (1985-2023) National Land Cover Database: Improving on a 30-year Legacy.”

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The USGS EROS User Services team is pleased to announce the upcoming “The New Annual (1985-2023) National Land Cover Database: Improving on a 30-year Legacy” webinar! Please join us for the upcoming EROS User Experience Webinar Series, where we talk to staff at the Earth Resources Observation and Science (EROS) center to learn more about the data, tools, and services available from EROS that impact our data users.

The genesis of the National Land Cover Database (NLCD) began in the early 1990s, when a group of Federal agencies with a common need for Landsat data established the Multi-Resolution Land Characteristics (MRLC) Consortium. MRLC partners quickly identified the need for shared, consistent, national-scale land cover to support partner needs and initiated development of 1992 NLCD, the first Landsat-based, national-scale land cover product for the US. Since that first product, NLCD has been the gold standard for US land cover mapping and monitoring. Based on advances in cloud computing, improved sensor technologies, and AI-based algorithm development, USGS has now developed the next generation of the NLCD, with the October 2024 release of the new Annual NLCD 1.0. The new NLCD uses an ensemble of deep-learning based algorithms to map, monitor, and synthesize the complexities of land use, cover, and condition change through time, characterizing annual change from 1985 through 2023 for the conterminous United States. Annual NLCD includes a suite of six products:

1. Land Cover
2. Land Cover Change
3. Land Cover Confidence
4. Fractional Impervious Surface
5. Impervious Descriptor
6. Spectral Change

The newest iteration of NLCD provides a much longer historical record than past NLCD versions, while new cloud-based deep learning methodologies facilitate annual data updates and position USGS to continually improve NLCD products over time. As with past products, NLCD will continue to provide scientists, land managers, and decision makers with foundational, accurate and timely land cover and land change data for the Nation, feeding the countless government and private sector applications of NLCD including human health, natural hazards and safety, water quality, climate and weather, biodiversity, economic development, and risk management and mitigation.

This webinar will provide information on the history of NLCD, details on the new Annual NLCD products, plans for future datasets, and impacts NLCD data have had on science applications, land managers, and decision-makers.

Our guest speakers will be Terry Sohl the Chief of Integrated Science and Applications Branch, Jon Dewitz a Physical Scientist, and Jesslyn Brown a Research Geographer all located at the USGS EROS.

This 1-hour webinar will occur on Thursday, October 24, 2024, at 1:00 pm CDT (UTC/GMT-5).

Please register to attend the “The New Annual (1985-2023) National Land Cover Database: Improving on a 30-year Legacy” webinar. Once you have registered for the webinar, please either click the “Add to Calendar” on the confirmation page or check your email, and possibly your spam folder, for a follow up “You’re registered” email from DOI Teams and add the event to your calendar from that email, to ensure the webinar is saved to your calendar.

Please feel free to forward this invite to your colleagues and to reach out to the USGS EROS User Services team at custserv@usgs.gov with any questions. This webinar will be recorded and will be available on the USGS Trainings YouTube channel at a later date.

If you would like to sign up for the EROS User Group (EUG) listserv to be notified of all future webinar opportunities, please email custserv@usgs.gov.

Thank you,
The USGS EROS User Services Team

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A recording from this webinar is now live: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qMs25ySkWLA

Please contact custserv@usgs.gov if you have any questions after watching the recording.