General information
Information on national environmental and security-related programmes and activities is available on the following websites:
NERC has several collaborative centres, among which the National Centre for Earth Observation, which was created in April 2008 and groups together the following centres:
1 CASIX (Centre of Observation of Air-Sea Interactions and Fluxes)
2 CLASSIC (Climate and Land-Surface Systems Interaction Centre)
3 COMET (Centre for Observation and Modelling of Earthquakes and Tectonics)
4 CPOM (Centre for Polar Observation and Modelling)
5 CTCD (Centre for Terrestrial Carbon Dynamics)
6 DARC (Data Assimilation Research Centre)
7 ESSC (Environmental Systems Science Centre)
NERC has established a knowledge transfer network called NCAVEO to support the calibration and validation of Earth observation data.
The British National Space Centre Working Group
Within the UK, an interdepartmental working group organised by the British National Space Centre meets to inform UK departments and define UK priorities for GMES.
Members of this group are representatives from the Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs, the Foreign & Commonwealth Office Home, the Department of Trade and Industry, the Maritime and Coastguard Agency, the Home Office, the Department for International Development, the Met. Office and The Natural Environment Research Council.
Natural Hazard Working Group
Following the tragic Asian tsunami on 26 December 2004, the Prime Minister asked the Government’s Chief Scientific Adviser, Sir David King, to convene a group of experts (the Natural Hazard Working Group) to advise on the mechanisms that could and should be established for the detection and early warning of global physical natural hazards.
The outcomes of this working group are available in a report dated June 2005 and entitled The Role of Science in Physical Natural Hazard Assessment
Land Cover and Related Domains
In the United Kingdom there are several existing datasets that provide information in the land cover and related domains.
Generally it is accepted that different users take different perspectives on the landscape therefore an urban planner will look for different characteristics in a land cover dataset than someone who is managing the ecology for example. Therefore the greater the linkages between datasets the greater the potential to share, reuse and join up data.
The primary datasets in the UK are:
- OS MasterMap Topo. This is a database of over 430 million features in the landscape of Great Britain – each one is classified e.g. Building, Road, Water, Woodland etc. OS MasterMap is built in Digital National Framework principles. See link. Note also that Ordnance Survey of Northern Ireland cover Northern Ireland
- Seazone Hydrospatial. This data covers the marine environment. Seazone Hydrospatial and OS MasterMap are built to DNF principles and can be used together. See link.
- Land Cover Map 2000. This is a detailed Land Cover Map covering the UK supporting several needs across government. See link.
- Previously Developed Land. This is a record of all previously developed land to encourage greater recycling of land for building. It is planned to extend the database to a full National Land Use Specification. See link.
The integration and linking of different datasets provides greater reuse and data integrity as well as user data sharing. The Digital National Framework is being developed to support this. More information will be found on: www.dnf.org
Participation in EU and ESA funded Projects
The Natural Environment Research Council is involved in GEOLAND
The British Geological Survey is part of the core user groups involved in the TerraFirma ESA GMES Services Element.
The Environment Agency participates as a core user in the ROSES ESA GMES Services Element.
UK participation in European organisations
UK participates in organisations whose activities are potentially relevant to GMES:
- European Space Agency (ESA)
- European Environmental Agency (EEA)
- European Environmental Bureau (EEB)
- European-Mediterranean Seismological Centre (EMSC)
- European Sea Level Service (ESEAS)
- European component of Global Ocean Observing System (EUROGOOS)
- European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF)
- Europe's Meteorological Satellite Organisation (EUMETSAT)
- Network of European Meteorological Services (EUMETNET)
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