EUSeaMap 2021 Broad-Scale Predictive Habitat Map - Arctic Mask (Habitat Descriptor)

Arctic mask shapefile produced by EMODnet Seabed Habitats as an input layer for the 2021,2023 and 2025 EUSeaMap broad-scale habitat models. Used as a proxy to delimit the Arctic zone and it is used to classify shallow habitats into Arctic habitat classes as required by the EUNIS 2022 habitat classification. Details on the methods used to classify EUSM are present in the report linked in the Online Resources (Vasquez et al., 2021a).

The masks covers areas in the Barents Sea which are North of the polar front or where ice concentration exceeded 20% on average in 2018. The 20% threshold was derived from WMO ice classification and corresponds to "Very open drift ice".

Created by the EMODnet Seabed Habitats project consortium in 2021, and used in the 2023 and 2025 versions of EUSeaMap. No updates have been made to this layer.

A report on the methods used to create the layer are in the 2021 version of EUSeaMap (Vasquez et al., 2021b) and reports on previous versions (v2019 and v2023) are linked in the lineage. A report on the methods used in the 2025 version of EUSeaMap will be added in due course.

Credit: Licensed under CC-BY 4.0 from the European Marine Observation and Data Network (EMODnet) Seabed Habitats initiative (https://emodnet.ec.europa.eu/en/seabed-habitats), funded by the European Commission.