Identification

Title

Living England Habitat Map (Phase 4)

Alternative title(s)

Living England Habitat Map Phase 4

Abstract

The Living England project, led by Natural England, is a multi-year programme delivering a satellite-derived national habitat layer in support of the Environmental Land Management (ELM) System and the Natural Capital and Ecosystem Assessment (NCEA) Pilot. The project uses a machine learning approach to image classification, developed under the Defra Living Maps project (SD1705 – Kilcoyne et al., 2017). The method first clusters homogeneous areas of habitat into segments, then assigns each segment to a defined list of habitat classes using Random Forest (a machine learning algorithm). The habitat probability map displays modelled likely broad habitat classifications, trained on field surveys and earth observation data from 2021 as well as historic data layers. This map is an output from Phase IV of the Living England project, with future work in Phase V (2022-23) intending to standardise the methodology and Phase VI (2023-24) to implement the agreed standardised methods. The Living England habitat probability map will provide high-accuracy, spatially consistent data for a range of Defra policy delivery needs (e.g. 25YEP indicators and Environment Bill target reporting Natural capital accounting, Nature Strategy, ELM) as well as external users. As a probability map, it allows the extrapolation of data to areas that we do not have data. These data will also support better local and national decision making, policy development and evaluation, especially in areas where other forms of evidence are unavailable. Process Description: A number of data layers are used to inform the model to provide a habitat probability map of England. The main sources layers are Sentinel-2 and Sentinel-1 satellite data from the ESA Copericus programme. Additional datasets were incorporated into the model (as detailed below) to aid the segmentation and classification of specific habitat classes. Datasets used: Agri-Environment Higher Level Stewardship (HLS) Monitoring, British Geological Survey Bedrock Mapping 1:50k, Coastal Dune Geomatics Mapping Ground Truthing, Crop Map of England (RPA), Dark Peak Bog State Survey, Desktop Validation and Manual Points, EA Integrated Height Model 10m, EA Saltmarsh Zonation and Extent, Field Unit NEFU, Living England Collector App NEFU/EES, Long Term Monitoring Network (LTMN), Lowland Heathland Survey, National Forest Inventory (NFI), National Grassland Survey, National Plant Monitoring Scheme, NEFU Surveys, Northumberland Border Mires, OS Vector Map District , Priority Habitats Inventory (PHI) B Button, European Space Agency (ESA) Sentinel-1 and Sentinel-2 , Space2 Eye Lens: Ainsdale NNR, Space2 Eye Lens: State of the Bog Bowland Survey, Space2 Eye Lens: State of the Bog Dark Peak Condition Survey, Space2 Eye Lens: State of the Bog (MMU) Mountain Hare Habitat Survey Dark Peak, Uplands Inventory, West Pennines Designation NVC Survey, Wetland Inventories, WorldClim - Global Climate Data "Contains data supplied by ©Natural England ©Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, Natural England Licence No. 2011/052 British Geological Survey © NERC. All rights reserved., © Environment Agency copyright and/or database right 2015. All rights reserved. ©Natural England © Crown copyright and database right [2014], © Rural Payments Agency, © Natural England © 1995–2020 Esri, Contains Environment Agency information © Environment Agency and/or database rights. Some information used in this product is © Bluesky International Ltd/Getmapping PLC. Contains freely available data supplied by Natural Environment Research Council (Centre for Ecology & Hydrology; British Antarctic Survey; British Geological Survey). Contains OS data © Crown copyright [and database right] (2014), © Environment Agency copyright and/or database right 2015. All rights reserved., Esri, Maxar, Earthstar Geographics, USDA FSA, USGS, Aerogrid, IGN, IGP, and the GIS User Community, Contains Ordnance Survey data © Crown copyright and database right 2021., EODS / CEDA ARD: ESA Copernicus: 'Contains modified Copernicus Sentinel data [2021]', © Carlos Bedson Manchester Metropolitan University, © Copyright 2020, worldclim.org" Fick, S.E. and R.J. Hijmans, 2017. WorldClim 2: new 1km spatial resolution climate surfaces for global land areas. International Journal of Climatology 37 (12): 4302-4315. Pescott, O.L.; Walker, K.J.; Day, J.; Harris, F.; Roy, D.B. (2020). National Plant Monitoring Scheme survey data (2015-2019). NERC Environmental Information Data Centre. https://doi.org/10.5285/cdb8707c-eed7-4da7-8fa3-299c65124ef2 © UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology © Joint Nature Conservation Committee © Plantlife © Botanical Society of Britain and Ireland The following acknowledgement is required for use of this dataset: The National Plant Monitoring Scheme (NPMS) is organised and funded by the UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology, Botanical Society of Britain and Ireland, Plantlife and the Joint Nature Conservation Committee. The NPMS is indebted to all volunteers who contribute data to the scheme.

Resource type

dataset

Resource locator

https://naturalengland-defra.opendata.arcgis.com/datasets/Defra::living-england-habitat-map-phase-4/about

protocol: WWW:LINK-1.0-http--link

name: ArcGIS Open Dataset record page

description: ArcGIS Open Dataset record page

http://publications.naturalengland.org.uk/publication/4918342350798848

protocol: WWW:LINK-1.0-http--link

name: Technical User Guide (NERR108)

description: Living England: Satellite-based habitat classification- Technical User Guide (NERR108)

https://environment.data.gov.uk/spatialdata/living-england-habitat-map-phase4/wms

protocol: OGC:WMS

name: Defra Data Services Platform WMS

description: Defra Data Services Platform WMS

https://environment.data.gov.uk/spatialdata/living-england-habitat-map-phase4/wfs

protocol: OGC:WFS

name: Defra Data Services Platform WFS

description: Defra Data Services Platform WFS

https://environment.data.gov.uk/DefraDataDownload/?mapService=NE/LivingEnglandHabitatMapPhase4&mode=spatial

protocol: DSP:ESRI

name: Defra Data Services Platform Download

description: Defra Data Services Platform Download

https://environment.data.gov.uk/arcgis/rest/services/NE/LivingEnglandHabitatMapPhase4/MapServer

protocol: WWW:LINK-1.0-http--link

name: Living England Habitat Map (Phase 4) ESRI REST Map Server Endpoint

description: Living England Habitat Map (Phase 4) ESRI REST Map Server Endpoint

https://environment.data.gov.uk/arcgis/rest/services/NE/BiogeographicZonesLivingEngland2021Phase4/FeatureServer

protocol: WWW:LINK-1.0-http--link

name: Living England Habitat Map (Phase 4) ESRI REST Feature Server Endpoint

description: Living England Habitat Map (Phase 4) ESRI REST Feature Server Endpoint

Unique resource identifier

code

4aa716ce-f6af-454c-8ba2-833ebc1bde96_resource

codeSpace

Dataset language

eng

Spatial reference system

code identifying the spatial reference system

http://www.opengis.net/def/crs/EPSG/0/27700

Classification of spatial data and services

Topic category

environment

Keywords

Keyword set

keyword value

OpenData

Geographic location

West bounding longitude

-6.236

East bounding longitude

2.072

North bounding latitude

55.816

South bounding latitude

49.943

Extent

Extent group

authority code

code identifying the extent

GB-ENG

Temporal reference

Temporal extent

Begin position

1999-01-01

End position

2099-12-31

Dataset reference date

date type

creation

effective date

2022-03-31

date type

revision

effective date

2022-03-31

Frequency of update

notPlanned

Quality and validity

Lineage

Process Description: A number of data layers are used to inform the model to provide a habitat probability map of England. The main sources layers are Sentinel-2 and Sentinel-1 satellite data from the ESA Copericus programme. Additional datasets were incorporated into the model (as detailed below) to aid the segmentation and classification of specific habitat classes. Datasets used: Agri-Environment Higher Level Stewardship (HLS) Monitoring, British Geological Survey Bedrock Mapping 1:50k, Coastal Dune Geomatics Mapping Ground Truthing, Crop Map of England (RPA), Dark Peak Bog State Survey, Desktop Validation and Manual Points, EA Integrated Height Model 10m, EA Saltmarsh Zonation and Extent, Field Unit NEFU, Living England Collector App NEFU/EES, Long Term Monitoring Network (LTMN), Lowland Heathland Survey, National Forest Inventory (NFI), National Grassland Survey, National Plant Monitoring Scheme, NEFU Surveys, Northumberland Border Mires, OS Vector Map District , Priority Habitats Inventory (PHI) B Button, European Space Agency (ESA) Sentinel-1 and Sentinel-2 , Space2 Eye Lens: Ainsdale NNR, Space2 Eye Lens: State of the Bog Bowland Survey, Space2 Eye Lens: State of the Bog Dark Peak Condition Survey, Space2 Eye Lens: State of the Bog (MMU) Mountain Hare Habitat Survey Dark Peak, Uplands Inventory, West Pennines Designation NVC Survey, Wetland Inventories, WorldClim - Global Climate Data

Conformity

Data format

name of format

Proprietary format | ESRI File based Geodatabase (GDB)

version of format

Constraints related to access and use

Constraint set

Use constraints

Open Government Licence

Constraint set

Limitations on public access

There are no public access constraints to this data. Use of this data is subject to the licence identified.

Responsible organisations

Responsible party

organisation name

Natural England

email address

data.services@naturalengland.org.uk

web address

https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/natural-england

description: Natural England Website

responsible party role

pointOfContact

Metadata on metadata

Metadata point of contact

organisation name

Natural England

email address

data.services@naturalengland.org.uk

responsible party role

pointOfContact

Metadata date

2022-10-12

Metadata language

eng