(TEST PROJECT - do not pledge)

Using satellites and AI to map habitats

This three-year project made possible thanks to players of People's Postcode Lottery will see the University of Surrey and the Surrey Wildlife Trust working in partnership with Buglife and the Painshill Park Trust. The team will enlist the help of the public to inform their work in the newly emerging field of Earth Observation – combining satellite technology and artificial intelligence – to monitor and improve wildlife habitats.

Space4Nature Test Sites

Before the project is applied county-wide, it will first be necessary to test and refine our land mapping tools, and in particular to help ‘train’ the AI to effectively identify and classify different types of habitat. From spring 2023, Surrey Wildlife Trust will therefore be working with citizen science volunteers to collect data on the ground at a number of test sites.

These sites have been selected because we already have a good amount of habitat data which can then be augmented by citizen science surveys. This will enable us to test and refine the outputs generated by the AI process and build mapping tools to accurately classify other areas where we do not have as much habitat data.

What will your funding do?

• Combine Very High Resolution (VHR) Earth Observation satellite imagery with ecological knowledge and citizen science ground truthing to enable remote Monitoring, Reporting, and Verification of the quality, connectivity and occurrence of suitable habitat

• Create an inventory for grasslands of any soil pH to inform the planned comprehensive review of Surrey’s County Wildlife Sites

• Expand the number of test sites for the NRN to encompass the breadth of Surrey’s “old grassland” sites