LUH1: Harmonized Global Land Use for Years 1500-2100, V1

Land use categories of cropland, pasture, primary land, secondary (recovering) land, and urban land, and underlying annual land-use transitions, are included. Annual data on age and biomass density of secondary land, as well as annual wood harvest, are included for each grid cell.

Historical land cover data for the years 1500 - 2005 are based on HYDE 3.1 and future land cover projections for the period 2006 - 2100 came from four Integrated Assessment Model (IAM) scenarios which reach different levels of radiative forcing by year 2100: MESSAGE (8.5 W/m2), AIM (6 W/m2), GCAM (4.5 W/m2), and IMAGE (2.6 W/m2). A key feature of these data is that historical reconstructions of land use were harmonized (computationally adjusted to minimize differences at the transition period) with modeled future scenarios, allowing for a seamless examination of historical and future land use.