This working paper presents a dasymetric binary method to construct a population density grid for Spain that assigns population only to urban polygons. We argue that this binary method is likely to commit less error in representing population density for Spain than other downscaling methods currently in use, in particular the one used by the Joint Research Centre (JRC) in constructing a population grid for the whole of Europe from municipality (LAU2) data and CORINE Land Cover (CLC) information.

We examine the resolution of CLC in relation to the spatial population distribution in Spain, and conclude that, in general, population in Spain is highly concentrated in urban nuclei; as information on urban boundaries is lacking in official statistics, we construct them from cartography using building density, and assign population using a very detailed data set. An application for a NUTS2 region is offered as an example.