Mapping forest fires in Spain using MODIS reflectance and active fire data

Forest fires are a major source of concern for both environmental and safety reasons in many parts of the world since they cause casualties as well as important economic, social and environmental losses. Besides, these events play an important role in global warming and global climate change, being responsible for a significant amount of greenhouse gases, particulates and aerosols emissions into the atmosphere. The scientific community dealing with modelling of anthropogenic emissions demands global assessments of the timing and spatial extent of biomass burning, a task that nowadays is only affordable using remote sensing techniques.