ABSTRACT
Land Cover Change (LCC) and its environmental consequences are global challenges, as pointed out by IPCC: climate processes are indirectly affected by land surfaces and the materials on the ground, and soil has a major role in carbon fluxes and greenhouse gas emissions. One of the main drivers of LCC is urban development, especially in the form of soil consumption that is the conversion from natural to artificial land cover. The land consumption phenomenon is the increase of artificial land use at the expense of natural and semi-natural land use. Land cover monitoring can provide the spatial data required for assessing ecosystem services and supporting decision making. Land cover monitoring is becoming a crucial activity in order to assess soil consumption and consequently adapt current policies at the various administrative levels. However, considering the complexity of environmental effects caused by soil consumption at the local level, it is fundamental that land cover monitoring could assess even little changes.
