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Rokos, Demetrius 
ENVIRONMENTAL LEGISLATION COMPLIANCE MAPS AT NATIONAL LEVEL: 
THE GREEK FOREST LAW CASE 
. D. Rokos', V. Karathanassi', E. Levantis™ 
"National Technical University of Athens, Greece 
Laboratory of Remote Sensing 
naturesl@central.ntua. gr, rslab@survey.ntua.gr 
University of Athens, Greece 
European Public Law Center 
elan@hol.gr 
Working Group VII/2 
KEY WORDS: Buildings, Change detection, Edge extraction, Image processing, Interpretation, Land use / Land cover, 
Monitoring, Remote Sensing. 
ABSTRACT 
This paper investigates the possibility of producing reliable Environmental Legislation Compliance Maps at National 
level, by means of Earth Observation data and their appropriate processing and analysis using remote sensing methods 
and techniques. Research has been implemented and evaluated on the Greek Forest Law application. 
An analysis of the Greek Forest Law indicated eight different law categories in which Environmental Legislation 
Compliance Maps could reliably be used: forests and forest areas; land-use planning and extension of city plans; 
fencing of private forests and forest areas; illegal building in forests and forest areas; fragmentation of forests and forest 
areas; quarries; reforestation of burnt forests and forest areas; Building Associations. 
For each category, legal, administrative and technical requirements in order to produce the appropriate Environmental 
Legislation Compliance Maps have been defined. In the technical requirements, special emphasis has been placed on 
the remote sensing interface, the objects to be detected by remote sensing methods and techniques, and the remote 
sensing data, method and technique requirements, for each specific category. 
Product requirements lead to the specification of the Environmental Legislation Compliance Maps appropriate for each 
law category, e.g. the definition of the information levels, the choice of the appropriate scale of the map, the graphic 
depiction of objects/layers, the color of lines or shaded areas, the nomenclature, etc. 
The Environmental Legislation Compliance Map showing potential illegal buildings in forests and forest areas in the 
municipalities of Old and New Penteli, Attika, Greece has been produced, as an example. 
1 INTRODUCTION : 
Earth Observation and Monitoring methods and techniques and Space and Airborne Remotely Sensed analogue and 
digital image processing can detect, discriminate, recognize, understand, measure, compare, correlate, evaluate, analyze, 
process, and interpret significant information vector and raster data, objects, patterns, conditions, similarities and 
change trends of the Natural and Socioeconomic Reality as well as of their multidimensional relations, 
interdependencies and interactions (Rokos, 1988). Thus, all the procedures, plans, studies and works of Integrated and 
Worthliving Development (simultaneously economic, social, cultural, political and technical/technological, and for that 
reason sustainable) and Protection of the natural and socioeconomic environment could (under specific presuppositions) 
be reliably and efficiently assisted by the appropriate imagery and remote sensing methods and techniques, taking into 
consideration that all persons involved in these procedures (scientists, engineers, citizens, administrators, politicians, 
judges, judiciaries) could clearly communicate, understand, evaluate and document relevant activities, impacts, 
judgements and decisions (Rokos, 1994a). 
This paper investigates the possibility of producing reliable Environmental Legislation Compliance Maps at National 
level, by means of Earth Observation data and their appropriate processing and analysis using remote sensing methods 
and techniques. These maps essentially focus on containing evidence material for judicial and administrative 
procedures. Two information levels, one which identifies areas where a legal rule is applied and another. which 
identifies areas where there is an infringement of that rule, are represented in each Environmental Legislation 
Compliance Map (APERTURE 1997, 1998a). 
From the legal point of view, a methodology which defines National Environmental Legislation in a form that could be 
  
International Archives of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing. Vol. XXXIII, Part B7. Amsterdam 2000. 1267