United Kingdom

Statement of the United Kingdom

The UK welcomes continued engagement with GEO and the opportunity to contribute to its governance, working groups, and multiple Work Programme initiatives and activities – most recently the Global Ecosystem Atlas.

We recognise the significant benefits that this engagement brings for all members, through building international collaboration, discussions on analysis-ready data and open science, and sharing lessons learnt with other countries. We continue to value the opportunity to share our own progress and innovations as part of a global effort to address current and emerging challenges.

Climate

When the GEO Plenary met in 2021, the UK had just hosted United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) 26th Conference of the Parties (COP26), in Glasgow, where nearly 200 countries agreed the Glasgow Climate Pact to keep 1.5 °C alive and finalise the outstanding elements of the Paris Agreement.

A priority for the UK is to ensure that COP28 delivers an outcome that puts the world on track to keep temperature rise below 1.5 °C, halving global emissions by 2030. We also need to build resilience to current and future climate impacts, and halt and reverse global biodiversity loss by 2030.  This year, countries must deliver on their commitments to mobilise finance for developing economies (to reach $100bn in 2023). 

The UK recognises the continued role of GEO in providing inputs to the Research and Systematic Observations discussions of the UNFCCC and its contribution in promoting climate action by governments using EO data and products that provide reliable, timely and accurate information.  

There is huge potential for EO to support work that builds on the outcomes of previous COPs, and for EO to facilitate progress and inform discussions as we look towards COP28.  The UK remains dedicated to being at the forefront of EO technology, research, and collaboration, working with existing and developing new partnerships. The UK Space Agency (UKSA) is funding several research projects which includes providing standardised methane measurements from space. This will improve transparency and comparability of emissions estimates which underpin climate decision making, recognising the significant impact that methane has as a Greenhouse Gas (GHG). 

Satellite-based EO can provide measurement of atmospheric greenhouse gas emissions concentrations at both regional and global level and the GHGSat currently provides methane emissions data to the UK. Remote sensing has the potential to inform both top-down and bottom-up emissions estimates and reduce uncertainty in the GHG emissions inventory and could be used in association with other methods not only in tracking progress to meeting the UK’s 2050 Net Zero target, but also meeting international and domestic reporting requirements if data processing and uncertainty analysis is standardised for all users around the world.

In 2022, UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) invested £5 million in new observational infrastructures for research into improved methods of verifying progress towards net-zero emissions at a national level. The aim is to support development of a pre-operational system with more significant capabilities for GHG flux estimation than previously possible through use of ground-based remote sensing, tall towers and EO, with first set of results due soon. 

The UK is putting additional efforts into understanding and tracking its climate, especially greenhouse gas emission sources and sinks. A new project on Greenhouse Gas Emissions Measurements and Modelling Advancement (GEMMA) is investigating a new pre-operational system for UK emissions verification on monthly timescales through a team led by the National Physical Laboratory supported by the National Centre for Earth Observation. In addition, the UK Space Agency has invested in GHGSat data for the UK and in studies of emission regulations of methane through our Space4Climate network. The UK is very pleased to have instituted a new EO Climate Information Service which is deepening the UK’s ability to characterise the path of climate change through UK and global data sets - from satellites.

In 2022 the UK signed the Charter for the Space Climate Observatory (SCO) and this year announced the first climate projects to be accepted into the international Observatory at the first Global Space for Climate Conference (GLOC) in Oslo, Norway: (1) Strata – an early warning system to identify where climate change could impact areas already affected by natural disasters or conflict, led by University of Edinburgh and (2) Space4Nature – using satellites and AI to map habitats, led by Surrey Wildlife Trust. This framework allows us to share best practice on climate change actions made possible using data from space. Space4Climate, chaired by UKSA, is the UK Focal Point to the Space Climate Observatory.  UKSA and other funding Board members are providing further funding over the next three years to Space4Climate, which spans government, industry, and academia, uniting those with expertise in the development of satellites, analysis and exploitation of the data they gather, and the production of globally assured global data and climate services, and has welcomed Defra to the group.

The opportunities that EO provides in the climate space are tremendous and the UK will ensure that our scientists and engineers are at the forefront of efforts to improve technology and services for end users.

Forests and Biodiversity

It is clear, that forests and wider biodiversity plays a unique and vital role in climate mitigation, as well as providing jobs and ecosystem services underpinning resilience to climate shocks and global food security. These benefits can only be realised if there are robust, effective and integrated systems for a country to track, monitor and respond to biodiversity loss and other land-use changes:

Last year the UK signed up to the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, setting out our ambition to conserve at least 30% of the world’s lands, inland waters, coastal areas and oceans, and to restore 30% of already degraded terrestrial and marine environments. Domestically, the UK also committed to leave the environment in a better state for future generations reaching net zero by 2050 while boosting the economy. This transformation in policymaking requires up-to-date evidence, that is accessible to a wide range of decision makers. 

The UK is therefore investing in a Natural Capital and Ecosystem Assessment (NCEA) project, a science innovation and transformation programme, which spans across land and water environments. It has been set up to collect data on the extent, condition and change over time of England’s ecosystems and natural capital, and the benefits to society. This builds on ‘Living England’, a multi-year project which delivers a habitat probability map for the whole of England, created using satellite imagery, field data records and other geospatial data in a machine learning framework.

We’re also delighted to announce that the UK will be funding the GEO-led Global Ecosystems Atlas project, the first international collaboration to agree on standards, integrate existing ecosystem maps and generate new data to create a harmonized tool for countries to effectively implement the Global Biodiversity Framework. The Atlas will also support other multilateral environmental agreements and commitments related to climate change, desertification, loss of wetlands, freshwater habitats, ocean health as well as the implementation of the System of Environmental Economic Accounting (SEEA), an internationally agreed statistical standard for valuing nature and the services it provides.

Last year also saw the announcement of England’s Peat Map project which aims to map the extent, depth and condition of England’s peat, using new and existing field survey data, satellite EO, and a variety of modelling methods.

Mapping England’s peat will help us achieve net zero by 2050 because by knowing where the peat is, and what condition it is in, we can identify areas for future restoration, or areas in need of additional protection.

Last year, the UK held discussions with national and international experts, including the Global Forest Observation Initiative (GFOI), to gain specialist insights for a potential UK programme to support forest Measurement, Reporting and Verification (MRV). This year, the UK turned that concept into reality, launching the new bespoke Accelerating Innovative Monitoring for Forests programme (AIM4Forests).

In partnership with FAO, this £24.5m programme will support up to 20 forest countries to institutionalise their National Forest Monitoring Systems, accelerate the alignment, innovation, and deployment of high-integrity datasets for MRV, and overcome methodological challenges towards accessing climate and carbon finance. It will also enhance the participation of Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities within forest monitoring and forest carbon standards.

This is a critical moment for forest countries and communities, and this new UK investment will help enable them to participate in REDD and seize the emerging carbon finance opportunities that aim to drive down global emissions from the forest and land-use sector, support livelihoods, and strengthen AFOLU contributions towards NDCs.

The UK also continues to support GEO-Trees in its site selections and is intending to assist with site characterisation in Africa. It is critical to provide reference sites for carbon and to link satellite with these in situ networks.

Oceans

The UK are utilising remote sensing and the use of AI and machine learning to understand, monitor and mitigate plastic pollution. Work funded by the UK government’s Earth Observation Centre for Excellence and the Blue Planet Fund is supporting the UK to establish itself as a world leader on technology and innovation for plastic pollution research. Through our use of satellites, drones and tow cameras we are collecting data to detect plastics on beaches, the seafloor, and floating on the ocean. We are developing the use of AI to train algorithms to automatically detect litter items. We aim to publish what we believe will be the largest and most detailed annotated litter dataset in the world as an open-source resource. We are collaborating with scientists and governments in the UK, Europe, Belize and Ghana to develop harmonised protocols to enable large scale spatial and temporal assessments at national, regional and global levels. This work will provide enhanced scientific knowledge which can contribute to the monitoring and evaluation of the UN Treaty on Plastic Pollution, and Sustainable Development Goal 14.1.

Agriculture

The UK developed the Crop Map in England (CROME) to support the UK’s agricultural Basic Payment Scheme utilising both Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) and optical data sourced from Sentinel-1 and Sentinel-2.

As CROME is an open-source data product, its uptake is significant across the UK Government, industry and academia supporting a broad range of environmental management and monitoring application from water quality models to food security. 

The UK is also pleased to confirm a continuation of its Overseas Development Assistance (ODA) to the GEO Global Agricultural Monitoring Initiative (GEOGLAM) in 2024, building on the work of GEOGLAM funded through Defra in previous years. The latest package of support has seen a focus on Less Developed Countries (LDCs). This has been achieved by enabling the extension of resource to support the development of a strategy regarding the implementation of the Supplemental National Adaptation Planning Guidance for the UNFCCC NAP process, and the coordination of GEOGLAM capacity development projects in LDCs.

Disaster Risk Reduction

The UK Space Agency-funded IPP CommonSensing project is a partnership between a United Nations-led international consortium and the nations of Fiji, the Solomon Islands and Vanuatu. The £9.6m project began in 2018 with the aim to create platforms that harness satellite remote-sensing data, combined with data held by government ministries, to support climate resilience activities in Small Island Nation Developing States (SIDS). By empowering communities with geospatial information, the project aims to allow decision-makers to create informed, data-driven judgements concerning climate-related issues, and developing new climate resilience strategies for mitigation and adaptation. CommonSensing provides nation-specific data so that information is tailored to the requirements of the relevant government stakeholders, the resulting deliverables and learnings can support the development of future regional earth observation initiatives such as Digital Earth Pacific.

The UK Space Agency has been a proud member of the International Charter Space and Major Disasters (the Charter) since 2005. The UK Space Agency took over the leadership responsibility of the Charter in April 2023, for period of six months, and was delighted to welcome Board Members to the UK in April 2023 for discussions. The Charter is a worldwide collaboration, through which satellite data are made available for the benefit of disaster response. By combining Earth observation assets from different space agencies, the Charter allows resources and expertise to be coordinated for rapid response to major disaster situations; thereby helping civil protection authorities and the international humanitarian community.

Earth Observation and Geospatial Information

The UK continues to grow the value proposition for EO. In support of this Ordnance Survey continues to work on a number of programmes and projects that demonstrate the important role that geospatial data has in unlocking the value of EO data and applying it for better analysis and decision-making. Foundational geospatial data is a key thread which brings the EO and geospatial communities together at the global, regional, and national levels.

During the last year Ordnance Survey has continued to support GEO through the development of its Global Heat Resilience Service with our knowledge and expertise gained through working with the UK Space Agency and the National Centre for Earth Observations. This work is especially important in the context of global sustainability.

Ordnance Survey also continues to drive forward conversations on sustainability – we recently wrote a Discussion Paper for the United Nations Committee of Experts on Global Geospatial Information Management on Geospatial Information for Climate Resilience. This paper spoke about how in a modern interconnected world, national data ecosystems do not stand in isolation. Strong partnerships and collaborations between different and complementary domains – driven by data integration – can strengthen climate resilience.

More broadly Ordnance Survey continues to support the national EO community through our role on the Board of Space4Climate, promoting geospatial and EO in global multilateral forums such as the Climate COPs. We also continue to develop solutions to global challenges through initiatives such as the Supply Chain Data Partnership and OS VeriEarth® or programmes such as the UN SEEDS (Sustainability Exploration Environmental Data Science).

The UK is supporting growth in the use of EO, including in public service, through its new EO Data Hub. The Hub will experiment with fusions of public and commercial satellite data, linking bespoke systems with those on public cloud, and prototyping new services. The UK is keen to promote advanced digital systems which are essential in delivering actionable information for society and economy.

UK National Space Strategy

In September 2021, the government published the National Space Strategy (NSS), our first ever combined civil-defence strategy for space. The publication set out an ambitious 10-year vision and high-level policy framework to shape how the government supports the space economy, with EO one of its strategic priorities. More recently, in the National Space Strategy in Action, the UK published our Earth Observation Priorities.

The UK civil EO priorities emphasise the importance of international collaboration to achieve shared economic and scientific goals in the fight against climate change. We remain firmly committed to the Committee on Earth Observation Satellites (CEOS) and its ambitions, which closely match those of GEO. UKSA have self-nominated to Chair CEOS for 2024-2025. The formation of partnerships like GEO and CEOS that is critical for sharing trusted data and best practice to inform policy decisions that will benefit the environment.

New EO Space Missions

The UK was proud to be part launch of the Surface Water and Ocean Topography (SWOT) mission in December 2022, a collaboration between NASA, CNES, UKSA, and Canadian Space Agency. The mission is aiming to provide the first global survey of Earth's surface water, observe the fine details of the ocean's surface topography, and measure how water bodies change over time. The mission will be calibrated by comparison to in situ measurements in the Bristol Channel.

The work in partnership with CNES (France) on the MicroCarb mission is progressing well and will be the first European Satellite dedicated to measuring atmospheric carbon dioxide. The build phase is almost complete, with launch expected as soon as possible. 

The UK is a major funder of the European Space Agency (ESA) and its EO programmes. At the ESA Council of Ministers 2022 we invested in an ambitious EO package, including the TRUTHS mission, new Climate Change Initiative (CLIMATE SPACE), Copernicus, Aeolus, Digital Twin Earth and the Future EO programme, which is ESA’s R&D programme that includes the Earth Explorer and Scout missions such as HydroGNSS – a small satellite mission that will measure key hydrological climate variables like soil moisture, permafrost, wetlands and biomass. The TRUTHS mission will be the first ‘measurement standard reference’ in space and will allow a step change in the accuracy in our understanding of Earth radiation balance and its contribution to climate change. It will also improve the performance and interoperability of other satellites through provision of high accuracy reference calibration from space.

The UKSA also contributed £2.2 million of funding for the MANTIS mission, the first nanosatellite to launch under ESA’s Incubed programme, which will demonstrate a high resolution EO camera for the natural resources sector once it launches in November 2023.

Furthermore, the UK is committed to strengthening its international relationships. Earlier this year, the UKSA launched its International Bilateral Fund – a £20 million grant funding programme designed to build and strengthen our international partnerships by working together on collaborative projects to further space research and develop innovative space-oriented technologies and capabilities. For EO, the response to the first phase of the Bilateral Fund has demonstrated the strong desire of international partners to work with the UK. Projects range from working with Australian partners on water quality monitoring or managing biosecurity risks, through to working with Canadian and Bahraini partners on development of a novel high-resolution CO2 sensor.

Looking ahead

The UK continues to take a leading role in Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) with an ongoing role as Co-Chair of the Working Group, taken on by Professor Stuart Marsh of the University of Nottingham. Notable developments in the past year have been a growing link to the GEO Indigenous Alliance and the Working Group are promoting their Water Summit, due at the end of 2023. An informal meeting of the Group will take place during GEO Week 2023.

We look towards COP28 this year, which will see the first Global Stocktake under the Paris Agreement. This will both assess progress against established goals and inform future action, and the EO community will have a vital role to play. The increasing importance and awareness of the role of EO in combatting climate change is clear from the focus on space at COP28. We look forward to showcasing the value of space as a tool for climate action through the space leaders’ summit and space pavilion. We also look forward to co-chairing an event with GEO secretariat and esteemed panellists in the UK pavilion, focused on the power of space to protect and restore nature worldwide.

We look forward to the opportunity to consider GEO’s role, vision and strategy beyond 2025 and we remain committed to engaging with the GEO Secretariat in taking this work forwards. 

EO continues to have a huge potential to facilitate progress and inform decisions to address the global challenges we face today, providing reliable and credible data as the world tackles climate change, biodiversity loss, natural and man-made disasters. The UK is dedicated to being at the forefront of EO technology, research and collaboration, working with existing and developing new partnerships and continuing its strong relationship with GEO to support our shared ambitions.