Using Space Data to Restore Nature: Four SME Projects Lead the Way with Take-Off Funding
Marketing
An AI-powered app helping children speak to endangered animals; a tool to use nature to fight climate change; a way to measure forest health; and a method to make decisions to build healthy communities – these four projects are using space data to help nature. The four projects beat fierce competition to receive up to £50,000 of funding to develop their projects for nature regeneration using space data through the Design to Deliver programme.
Design to Deliver is funded by Innovate UK. It is a collaboration between three Catapult centres: Connected Places Catapult, Digital Catapult and Satellite Applications Catapult. The programme supported 12 small to medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) to develop innovative ideas to regenerate nature. Sussex Bay is the location partner for the ‘Satellite Applications Catapult’ challenge which sees four of the total 12 small businesses use space data to achieve nature restoration and prove their solution in a real-world environment. The SMEs received specialist design and technical support to develop their solutions and trial them on location at Sussex Bay.
On Friday 28 March, the four businesses will showcase their innovative ideas at Brighton MET in front of an audience of investors and conservation innovators.
Sussex Bay is a community-born, nature-first project of hope which is driving ecological restoration along the Sussex coastline, from Selsey in the West to Camber Sands in the East. It is also the home of the UK’s first Blue Natural Capital Lab which is attracting funding for projects to restore nature along the UK’s coasts, rivers and waterways.
Dean Spears, Head of Sussex Bay, said:
“We are thrilled that Sussex Bay has been able to host the development of these four projects – each of which has the potential to make a difference in our fight to save nature. As home of the UK’s first Blue Natural Capital Lab, incubating promising new projects like these four is very much in our DNA. We wish them all well in their innovative quests for nature restoration, and we are excited to see how they develop.”
Catherine Greene, Head of User Centred Design at Satellite Applications Catapult, said:
“The four SMEs selected to respond to our challenge have identified use cases in land and biodiversity regeneration which are important focuses for government, local authorities, and planners. By incorporating space data into their solutions, the four SMEs are improving our ability to restore and protect nature. I am excited to follow the future progress of the four SMEs.”
The four projects in the Sussex Bay location, using space data for nature recovery, are:
Nature of Things: REWILDlife
This pioneering team – Ben Peacock and Chris Ralli – are piloting an AI-powered chatbot that allows young people to speak to endangered species. The team is trialling AI modelling, real time live GPS species-tracking data, weather data and ecological insights to create an interactive chatbot.
The idea is that in the prototype, people will be able to ask individual animals questions and receive AI-driven answers guided by the data and verified by scientists. The sort of questions people might ask could include: “What did you eat today? Where do you migrate? What weather or climate conditions did you experience? What did you eat, and was it difficult to find?
The intention of the project is to use current science and technology to give nature a voice and to help young people and adults to connect with nature, as a way to prompt more environmentally-friendly behaviour. The premise could be applied to any species – UK-based or international – and other natural bodies such as rivers.
Ben Peacock of REWILDlife said:
“The scale of the environmental crisis is daunting. We can all see examples in our own lives: where I live in the Wye Valley, I see how pollutants have killed almost all the life in the river where I kayak. A lot of people are asking what they can do. At REWILDlife, we’re bringing together our skills and experience to create a brand new way for people – and especially young people – to connect with nature and illicit behavioural change.
“And if people feel connected with nature, they are more likely to want to save it. Our app will be for everyone, but we especially hope children and young people will engage with it, and perhaps then nudge their parents in taking action too.”
Using biodiversity to boost climate resilience: Map Impact
How can biodiversity help us to mitigate the effects of climate change? A team at Map Impact, led by Chris Burnett, is using satellite data to answer the question. They are particularly focused on monitoring biodiversity and climate risks over time, such as the risk of wild fires, heat stress and drought, and on how nature recovery and nature-based solutions can make locations more resilient to these risks.
In developing the technology, Map Impact is working within South Downs National Park to monitor biodiversity on a farm close to Chichester. The landowners have been rewilding some aspects of it, and the technology allows the team to map how the estate has changed since 2020. Map Impact’s ecology team will then visit to verify that what is happening on the ground matches what the space data indicates.
Such technology could be useful for groups including local authorities, land owners, utility companies and insurers.
Chris Burnett of Map Impact said:
“The truth is we cannot stop climate change in its tracks entirely without rapidly stopping burning fossil fuels – but if we work with nature, we can mitigate some impacts in some places. Our plan is to use space data to guide us in this. By looking at what has worked in an area in the past we can determine what steps to take to protect it in future. We might ask: in which spot should we plant new woodland? What type of trees should they be? How often has it flooded here? What is the risk of a wild fire? How can we change the river landscape to create flood, drought and fire resilience?
“The satellite data allows us to look back in time too, to see how nature has been restored in a location since 2020. That’s crucial for those needing to prove that sites have not been degraded prior to agreement of a ‘Biodiversity Net Gain’ scheme, in line with the UK government’s new policy on this.”
TreeStock: Data Dynamics
The team at Data Dynamics are developing an AI-powered system called ‘TreeStock’ that combines Earth Observation data and AI to identify individual trees, providing insights and monitoring their health. What’s special about their idea is its scale: it can cover wide areas of woodland and forestry without the need for manual ground surveying.
The power of this will be to monitor tree health, and to spot outbreaks of tree disease which are becoming increasingly common with the changing climate.
The technology could be useful for landowners, charities and public sector bodies who manage forests.
To help the team develop their plans, within the Sussex Bay area, they are interviewing experts from groups like Sussex Wildlife Trust, Forestry Commission, the University of Sussex and local authorities.
Gregory Meyers, CEO of Data Dynamics:
“As has been said many times before by those working on solutions to the climate crisis: imagine if we could create some revolutionary new technology that absorbed carbon straight from the air and also magically replicated itself … oh wait we do… they’re called trees. It’s a bit of a joke, but there’s some seriousness to it too. Not only are trees beautiful but they are also critical in our fight against climate change, and we believe their potential has been undervalued. That’s what drives us at Data Dynamics.”
Creating healthy communities: Optimal Cities
The team at Optimal Cities, led by Silviu Pirvu and Cezar Rujan, are using satellite data to build healthier cities.
Their intention is to help planers and developers to make well-founded decisions quickly, in order to build prosperous, greener cities for the people who live in them, while mitigating environmental risks such as via flood defences.
In the UK and USA, Census data drives decision-making but these datasets can be four or five years old. Instead, Optimal Cities combine spatial accessibility, satellite intelligence, wearable technology and sensors to build accurate and current information.
Silviu Pirvu FRSA, co-founder of Optimal Cities said:
“If we want healthy people, we need to improve the liveability of cities, where many people live.
“We want to help people to be able to analyse places in a split-second so they can shape the future of their environment. All of this new ‘awhereness’ creates the potential for a lot more transparency and accountability and should mean that communities can have an informed stake in the planning decisions which affect them.”
