The LUMOS Consortium

The LUMOS consortium is a partnership of governmental institutes and universities with a special interest in Land Use Modeling. The LUMOS consortium facilitates exchange of knowledge and experience between the different parties.

Participants
The participating organizations within the LUMOS consortium have been cooperating for a long time. In 2003 the organizations declared their intention for ongoing cooperation. The participants within the consortium are:

• Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency (PBL), chair and founder of the consortium
• Deltares (Deltares) 
• Department of Transport and Shipping (DVS) 
• Utrecht University (UU) 
• Wageningen University and Research Centre (WUR) 
• Delft University of Technology (TUD) 
• Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam (VUA) 
• Research Institute for Knowledge Systems (RIKS) 
• Object Vision (OV)

The knowledge platform for spatial modelling
The LUMOS consortium is a national and international platform for exchange of knowledge concerning Land Use Modeling. The consortium gives evidence of its prominent scientific position in Land Use Modeling by means of scientific publications and international lectures. The participants exchange scientific knowledge on the factors determining the land use changes, and cooperate in their research in this field. The emphasis of the research lies on spatial modeling of these factors, the relationships with thematical models and the evaluation and visualization of model results.

Practical Policy Support
The Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency (PBL), chair and founder of the LUMOS consortium, is one the three independent assessment agencies in the Netherlands. These agencies all have a role to play in giving substance to the World Bank’s People-Planet-Profit concept, with the Social and Cultural Planning Office of the Netherlands (SCP)dealing with ‘ People’, the Netherlands Bureau forEconomic Policy Analysis (CPB), with ‘ Profit’ and the Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency (PBL) with the ‘Planet’.

It is the primary task of the PBL to advise the Dutch government on a wide variety of environmental issues from a scientific base built on knowledge and expertise. Policy-makers use PBL research findings to develop, implement and enforce environmental policy. PBL underpins policy through its monitoring, modelling and risk and impact assessment results. Operating within the bounds of the Environmental Protection Act and the Nature Conservation Act, the PBL has assumed the role of charting the current status of the environment and nature in collaboration with a range of scientific institutes and other national assessment agencies to support a broad, but ecologically based, political and social discussion.