The course highlights various environmental issues and demonstrates how these can be explored using a GIS. The course starts with an introduction to Decision Support Systems (DSS). Decision support, or even Spatial DSS, has provoked large interest both among scientists and users (decision makers). The environmental topics that will be dealt with are:

• Sea Level Changes. A Digital Elevation Model (DEM) will be used to simulate a rather large sea level rise and the effects on cities and people will be estimated.
• Rivers and Nutrient leakage. Based on an extensive literature describing a river basin in south of Sweden you will be required to set up the workflow and sequential GIS operations in order to solve a series of problems relating to water quality.
• Vegetation change. Remote sensing will be used to study changes in vegetation cover over time for a large study area in northern China.
• During your work with the above tasks, you will gain knowledge and practical skills in spatial correlations and basic spatial modeling, as well as in managing data from various sources and with various qualities.

Finally the use of GIS as a tool for Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) will be introduced. This part involves both theoretical hand ins and practical exercises. The Practical part is a case study from Namibia, where different possible scenarios for a road construction are examined in respect of different environmental aspects.

NOTE: This is an internet based course. The course is part of the LUMA-GIS, the master program in GIS, but it is possible to read the course independently. You can read more about the master program, the admission requirements and other rules and regulations on the home page of the GIS programme.