The characterisation, analysis and exploration of the future development of landscapes is one of the focus research areas. The objective is to provide stakeholders with adequate information on changes of specific conditions and structural features in the natural environment.

By combining GIS and remote sensing methodologies decision support tools are developed for monitoring tasks in compliance with national and international regulations as well as for exploring options for interventions. This includes i.a. meta database development, spatial modelling, object-based image classification to extract landcover and landuse information. Present activities aim to investigate the interaction between landuse and water cycle at catchment scale in the context of the EU Water Framework Directive and the global EU Water Initiative.