Harmonized Global Land Use Grids from 1500 to 2100

Global fractional land use and land cover data at 0.5-degree resolution spans 1500 to 2100. The dataset harmonizes historical reconstructions based on HYDE 3.1 with future projections from four Integrated Assessment Model scenarios. It includes 20 different scenario products across 560 NetCDF files, created by ORNL_CLOUD.

Use Cases

• Modeling climate impacts using fractional land cover categories like cropland, pasture, and urban land.
• Analyzing long-term land transition trends with annual data on secondary land age and biomass density.
• Projecting future wood harvest and land recovery under different radiative forcing scenarios (e.g., MESSAGE 8.5 W/m2, IMAGE 2.6 W/m2).
• Studying spatial patterns of human land use at a 50-km grid cell resolution globally.
• Validating integrated assessment models with harmonized historical data from 1500-2005.

Strengths

• Covers an exceptionally long time range of 600 years (1500-2100).
• Provides harmonized data across historical and future periods, enabling seamless analysis.
• Includes 20 distinct scenario products based on four established Integrated Assessment Models.
• Offers spatially explicit data at a consistent 0.5-degree global grid resolution.

Limitations

• Sources conflict on the last updated date, with one showing 2026-03-13 and another showing a placeholder date of 2100-01-01.
• Specific column names and row counts are not provided in the available metadata.
• Data is delivered in 560 separate NetCDF files, which may require specialized handling.

Provenance

Source

ORNL_CLOUD

Collection Method

Historical data based on HYDE 3.1 reconstructions harmonized with future projections from four IAM scenarios (MESSAGE, AIM, GCAM, IMAGE).

Time Range

1500 to 2100

Freshness

2026-03 13 00:44:17.009677

Geography

Global at 0.5-degree (~50-km) spatial resolution.