Articles

Geoprocessing for environmental monitoring, with the same analysis in ArcGIS Pro, QGIS, PostGIS and Python

Hands-on articles with public data from INPE, MMA, IBAMA and SICAR (Brazil). Each article has a version for each program, with tested code.

Everyday problems for anyone monitoring deforestation, fire and protected areas in Brazil, each one solved in ArcGIS Pro, QGIS, PostGIS and Python, with open data and code you can copy. Pick your program in the tabs of one article, and the others open on it.

How the articles were made and where to download the data → Versão em português

Diagram with the same geoprocessing operations side by side in ArcGIS Pro, QGIS, PostGIS and Python.

From ArcMap to QGIS: the same tool in every program
Fundamentals
ArcMap

A table of equivalent tools in ArcMap, ArcGIS Pro, QGIS, PostGIS and Python (geopandas), and what changes when you update old arcpy scripts.

October 29, 2026

Map with protected areas in green, the 3 km surrounding band in yellow and DETER alerts colored by whether they fall inside or around.

Inside and around protected areas: the overlay every report uses
Protected areas
DETER

Separating what fell inside a protected area from what fell in the 3 km band around it, and measuring it in hectares. In ArcGIS Pro, QGIS, PostGIS and Python.

October 29, 2026

Bar chart with PRODES deforestation by year inside the protected areas of the Amazon and Cerrado study areas.

Annual PRODES deforestation in protected areas of the Amazon and the Cerrado
Protected areas
PRODES

Overlaying PRODES with protected areas, building the table by protected area and the time series, and adding a new year without duplicating it. One script for both biomes.

October 29, 2026

Map with protected areas in green and fire hotspots from the last 48 hours in red and orange.

Fire hotspots in protected areas over the last 24 and 48 hours
Fire
Protected areas

Downloading INPE’s fire hotspots straight from the public server, turning them into points, filtering the last hours and counting by protected area. In ArcGIS Pro, QGIS…

October 29, 2026

Ruler with the months of the calendar year and, below it, the months of the PRODES year starting in August.

Year, month and PRODES year: date fields in every program
Dates
Power BI

Creating year, month, month name, PRODES year (August to July) and PRODES month from a date, without depending on the computer’s language. In ArcGIS Pro, QGIS, PostGIS…

October 29, 2026

Line chart with the cumulative area of deforestation alerts over the months of the PRODES year, one line per year.

DETER monthly cumulative table, with zero-filled months
DETER
Dashboards
Power BI

The table behind the dashboard line chart: area of alerts by protected area and month, with zero in months without alerts, cumulative over the PRODES year and a flag for…

October 29, 2026

Diagram of two tables linked by the cnuc field, with the category and group columns passing from one to the other.

Bringing in data from another table: joins and lists of values
Tables

Bringing the protected area category and group to each alert through the CNUC code, and collapsing several values into a list (the municipalities of each protected area). In…

October 29, 2026

Map with protected areas in green and CAR rural properties colored by registration status, many of them inside the protected areas.

Rural properties (CAR) inside protected areas: selecting and measuring the overlap
CAR
Protected areas

Downloading Brazil’s Rural Environmental Registry from the public SICAR service, finding the properties that extend into protected areas and measuring how much of each…

October 29, 2026

Heat map of PRODES 2025 deforestation, from yellow to dark red, with protected area boundaries on top.

Kernel density of deforestation: where the pressure is concentrated
PRODES
Raster

Turning PRODES polygons into a heat map, combining the density of area and of polygon count into an index from 0 to 1, and comparing protected areas. In ArcGIS Pro, QGIS…

October 29, 2026

Map generated automatically for Jamanxim National Park, with title, legend, scale bar, north arrow and data source.

One map per protected area, automatically: from ArcMap to QGIS and Python
Maps
ArcMap

Generating the same map for every protected area without clicking, with arcpy.mapping in ArcMap, arcpy.mp and map series in ArcGIS Pro, the QGIS Atlas and a matplotlib loop.

October 29, 2026

First page of a PDF bulletin with a blue header, a summary paragraph, a table of alerts by protected area and a bar chart.

Automated PDF report: the bulletin that writes itself
Maps
Reports
Quarto

Combining text, table, chart and map into one PDF per protected area, generated by a script. With fpdf2 (Python), Quarto, the QGIS Atlas and ArcGIS Pro reports.

October 29, 2026

Map with groups of deforestation alerts colored by priority, from light yellow (very low) to dark red (very high).

Prioritizing alerts in ArcGIS Pro, QGIS and Python
DETER
Prioritization

Grouping neighboring alerts, measuring the area, count, recency and speed of each group, and turning it all into a priority score from 0 to 1. The same logic as the course…

October 29, 2026

Diagram with four ways to update a table, replace everything, replace a part, append only the new and insert or update.

Updating layers without duplicates: replace, append and incremental load
DETER
Automation

The four ways to update a database that receives new data every week, and the real pitfalls of DETER: repeated codes, a date filter with time zones and alerts published…

October 29, 2026
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Citation

BibTeX citation:
@misc{untitled,
  author = {},
  publisher = {Hendesson Alves},
  title = {Articles},
  url = {https://hendesson.github.io/en/articles/},
  langid = {en}
}
For attribution, please cite this work as:
“Articles.” n.d. In Geoprocessing Articles for Environmental Monitoring. Preprint, Hendesson Alves. https://hendesson.github.io/en/articles/.