Open KE fellowship: Exploitation of satellite remote sensing for regulation and monitoring of inland and coastal water quality

The UK environmental regulators are legally obligated (Section 8 Water Environment and Water Services (Scotland) Act 2003), EU Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD), EU Water Framework Directive (WFD)) to monitor the status of the water environment in river basin districts and territorial areas defined across the UK. They do this by assessing water quality and quantity. This is performed typically through ground based observations with site visits to hundreds of water bodies organised every year. This traditional method of monitoring is labour and cost intensive and although accurate, results are often unrepresentative (spatially and temporally) of the complete water environment. Furthermore, as the need for additional spatial coverage is increasing, the actual frequency of site sampling is decreasing. Satellite remote sensing could play an essential role in bridging the data gap by providing a complementary source of data for water quality monitoring (IOCCG, Societal Benefits). This fellowship aims to promote and aid the use of satellite remote sensing for improved regulatory monitoring of inland and nearshore coastal water quality. The applicant will work directly with environment agencies to develop satellite remote sensing as a viable and sustainable data resource. The fellowship will initially engage closely with the Scottish Environment Protection Agency but will extend the knowledge exchange activities to other UK environment agencies once established.

Until recently, various practical limitations restricted the use of satellite remote sensing as a tool for regulatory monitoring and reporting. The coarse spatial resolution of previous generation sensors meant they were incapable of capturing even the largest lakes in the UK. This has been overcome by the new generation of Sentinel sensors launched by the European Space Agency (ESA) which produce free and readily available images of the Earth at 0.01-0.3 km spatial resolution with a temporal sampling frequency between 3 and 5 days over the UK. As a consequence, satellite remote sensing is now a viable source of information for monitoring and reporting purposes. This technological advancement occurred in parallel with significant progress in water quality research in coastal and inland waters. Thanks to projects such as NERC GloboLakes, and the subsequent EC FP7 INFORM, H2020 DANUBIUS-RI and EOMORES, we now have improved solutions for retrieving water quality components remotely over regions influenced by land. Most notably, the NERC funded GloboLakes research programme produced a satellite-based observatory for more than 1000 lakes globally, including several of the larger Scottish lakes. This fellowship will further capitalise on the knowledge generated by the GloboLakes project to transform the output of world-leading science to maximise local benefit in the UK.

A large proportion of this KE fellowship will focus on advocating and integrating the use of satellite remote sensing as a data resource at SEPA and will involve regular consultation to highlight tangible benefits across a range of scientific disciplines. Having previously worked at SEPA in the Environmental and Spatial Informatics Unit, the applicant is in an advantageous position of understanding the structure of the Science and Strategy Directorate and having in place a solid network of collaborators. Here, satellite remote sensing could be exploited for several purposes; direct input into the WFD classification tool; identification of potential risk to water quality status; sampling management tool to optimise the representativeness of ground based measurements; harmful algal bloom detection for bathing water assessment; change detection for protected areas. The scope is significant and the technology currently exists, the key objective is helping the end user to realise the full potential of satellite remote sensing and providing an effective means for accessing data.