ABSTRACT
Wildfires are an increasing threat to safety, economy, and environment. Remote-sensing technologies offer a large diversity of environmental information to help fire risk-prevention services. In this regard, the European Copernicus program has integrated a suite of space-borne and in situ datasets to support a wide range of applications, including fire risk assessment. This chapter provides an overview of the Copernicus products and services that are currently used to evaluate fire risk conditions and offers a comprehensive approach to present efforts into observation, monitoring, analysis, and prevention of wildfires. Emphasis is given to the use of new space-borne microwave measurements of soil moisture and vegetation optical depth, which provide for the first time a direct measurement of the water content in soils and vegetation and are expected to complement and improve existing fire risk indices. Sample results of a fire risk model that relates soil moisture and temperature information to the potential spread of wildfires are presented for the Iberian Peninsula.
