Detecting Population and Built Environment Change from Space and their Impacts on Buried Utility Assets

Advances in Satellite and Earth observation technology are creating new ways in which we can study the interrelationships between populations and those places within which they live. This is creating great opportunities for the study of human dynamics through the lens of changes to the built environment; and provides a new set of reference points for those companies focused on delivery of services at this intersection.

MGISS are based within Liverpool City Region and have a vision to be a global leader in the use of Geospatial technology, location intelligence and advanced analytics to improve the long-term resilience of critical infrastructure such as buried utilities (water, gas, electricity, telco) and also major transportation networks.

The core of this project will involve the application of machine learning and AI (e.g. Classification / spectral mixture models) to satellite data to extract information on changes in human activity, and will additionally benefit from the close coupling of insight from MGISS, available asset owner data, environmental data and other ancillary sources such as planning application and approvals. Substantively this project will likely explore various observable changes such as infrastructure development (planned and in progress) and potential for identification of past, imminent, and future potential supply interruption impacts.