Region: Central/Europe

United Kingdom:
Environmental Change Network

T W Parr & A M Lane
Co-ordinator of the UK Environmental Change Network, NERC, Centre for Ecology and Hydrology,
Merlewood Research Station, Windermere Road, Grange-over-Sands, Cumbria, UK  LA11 6JU. 

   The ECN programme was established as a response to the concern over forecasts of global environmental in the late 1980’s and the recognition of the scientific and policy value of data collected systematically from networks of monitoring sites (Burt 1994, Tinker 1994). It was established in 1992 with the following specific objectives:

·  to establish and maintain a selected set of sites within the UK from which to obtain comparable long-term data sets by means of measurement at regular intervals of variables identified as being of major environmental importance;

·  to provide for the integration and analysis of these data sets, so as to identify environmental change and improve understanding of the causes of change;

·  to make these long-term data sets available as a basis for research and prediction;

·  to provide, for research purposes, a range of representative sites where there is good instrumentation and reliable environmental information.

   Sites began collecting data using the standard ECN measurement protocols in 1993, although many sites have historical data from before that date. By  2000, ECN had established:

·  an expanding network of 54 freshwater and terrestrial sites covering the main environmental gradients in the UK;

·  a programme of measurements on over 260 variables which drive, or respond to environmental change. Standardised recording for ECN’s terrestrial sites covers 11 sets of measurements on: meteorology, surface water drainage, surface water quality, atmospheric chemistry, precipitation chemistry, soil solution chemistry, soils, vegetation, invertebrates (moths, butterflies, ground beetles), vertebrates (rabbits, bats, common birds, frogs) and site management. Vegetation maps and aerial photograph coverage are available for each site. Measurements at ECN’s freshwater sites began in 1994 and covers measurements on water chemistry, water flow, chlorophyll, invertebrates, macrophytes, zooplankton, phytoplankton and epilithic diatoms.

·  standard  measurement protocols, quality assessment procedures and data validation procedures to ensure that all data collected are comparable in space and time (Sykes and Lane 1996, Sykes, Lane and George 1999);

·  links with other sectoral monitoring programmes or surveys in the UK which enable  ECN’s data to be used in combination with more spatially extensive data from other monitoring networks within the UK;

·  a central database and data management procedures designed to create seamless transition from data collection to data dissemination and from data provider to data user;

·  an Internet service to provide direct access to its Oracle summary database and real-time data on climate

(http://www.ecn.ac.uk/ecn/).

Network management

   ECN is funded by 15 sponsoring organisations. Each sponsor contributes towards the monitoring programme at one or more sites or by supporting network co-ordination. ECN’s sponsors are: Biotechnology & Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC); Countryside Council for Wales (CCW); Defence Evaluation Research Agency (DERA); Department of Agriculture for Northern Ireland (DANI); Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions (DETR); Department of the Environment for Northern Ireland (DOENI); English Nature (EN); Environment Agency (EA); Forestry Commission (FC); Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (MAFF); National Assembly for Wales (NAW); Natural Environment Research Council (NERC); Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA); Scottish Executive Rural Affairs Department (SERAD); and Scottish Natural Heritage (SNH).

   The organisational structure of ECN consists of a Steering Committee, a Statistical and Technical Advisory Group, a Central Co-ordination Unit (CCU) and groups of site managers.  The Steering Committee deals with policy and finance and consists of representatives from each sponsoring organisation.  The Statistical and Technical Advisory Group deals with technical development and data analysis.  Site managers deal with the day to day monitoring at ECN sites and meet annually to discuss operational matters and research opportunities. Finally, the network is co-ordinated by the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology on behalf of the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC), where the Central Co-ordination Unit is also responsible for the management of ECN’s central database.

   The initial contact point for all general enquiries is:

Dr Terry  Parr, Co-ordinator of the UK Environmental Change Network, NERC Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, Merlewood Research Station, Windermere Road, Grange-over-Sands, Cumbria, UK  LA11 6JU.  (Tel: 015395 32264) (E.mail  twp@ceh.ac.uk) (WWW: http://www.ecn.ac.uk/ecn)

Partnerships

   ECN is a broad ranging partnership between Government Departments, Government Agencies, Research Councils, Research Institutes and Universities. The main research organisations contributing data to the programme are: Agricultural Development Advisory Service (ADAS) at Drayton; Chemical and Biological Defence, Porton; Centre for Ecology and Hydrology;  Department of Agriculture for Northern Ireland; Forest Research, Alice Holt; Freshwater Fisheries Laboratory, Pitlochry; Institute of Grassland and Environmental Research (IGER) at North Wyke; Institute of Arable Crops Research (IACR) Rothamsted;  Macaulay Land Use Research Institute (MLURI); and the Environmental  Change Research Centre, University College London.

   ECN also collaborates closely with research scientists in Universities and Government Research Institutes in the UK and with scientists world-wide on projects related to the detection and interpretation of environmental change.

Special Activities - applications

   In the long-term, ECN’s data will be used in a range of applications including policy development, policy implementation, environmental reporting, and fundamental research programmes.  In the meantime, ECN sites and data are already being used in fields of policy, planning, commerce, education and the public appreciation of science. For example ECN is: 

·  providing instant access to regularly updated data over the Internet on a broad range of environmental attributes of public interest to inform on the ongoing consequences of such events as global climate change;

·  developing indicators and information for use  in national “State of the Environment” reports;

·  developing data interpretation methods to enable the key features (e.g. long-term trends, seasonal patterns) of the time series data collected to be highlighted (Parr & Hirst 1999);

·  providing real-time climate data from an Automatic Weather Station in the Pennines on the Internet;

·  developing educational links to promote the use of its data in schools and colleges.

Site level information

   ECN aims to provide a network which covers the main range of environmental conditions present in the UK. It uses sites with known management histories, existing data and a background of environmental research. There are currently 12 terrestrial sites (ranging from small 2 km²  intensively-managed lowland agricultural establishments to large, 65 km², semi-natural upland areas) and 42 freshwater sites (16 lakes and 26 rivers). The distribution of sites in the UK is shown in Figure 1 and some additional detail in Table 1. Full details of all sites are available through the ECN Web pages  (http://www.ecn.ac.uk/ecn/). All ECN sites undertake the standard set of measurements (Table 2.) and contribute data to the central ECN database.

Research

   ECN undertakes monitoring and research aimed at the detection and interpretation of environmental change in terrestrial and freshwater ecosystems. The measurements made by ECN are particularly relevant to environmental issues associated with some of the key pressures on ecosystems (impacts of climate change, atmospheric pollutants and changing land-use and land management) and their effects on key ecosystem responses (biodiversity, water resources (water quality and quantity) and soil quality and degradation). In recent years particular emphasis has been given to work relevant to the issues of climate change and water quality. ECN’s contribution to climate change research centres on the following activities:

·  monitoring and interpreting climate change impacts - indicators of climate change;

·  climate change impacts on biodiversity - understanding of baseline processes including the impacts of extreme events and interactions with changes in land-use;

·  the effects of drought on ecosystems;

·  climate change interactions e.g. with land use and atmospheric deposition;

·monitoring key components of the carbon cycle. 

      ECN’s structure and programme of standard measurements is specifically designed to encourage cross-site research. For example, ECN is:

·  setting standards for measurements (Sykes and Lane 1996, Sykes, Lane and George 1999); providing a range of  representative sites where there is good instrumentation and reliable environmental information for related research projects. ECN sites have been closely involved in some major UK research programmes run by the Natural Environment Research Council, including TIGER (Terrestrial Initiative in Global Environmental Research) and the Environmental Diagnostics Programme. More recently the upland-grassland site at ECN Sourhope (MLURI) has been used as the focus for a major research programme on Soil Biodiversity which aims to achieve simultaneously an understanding of biological diversity of the soil biota and the functional roles played by soil organisms in key ecological processes.

·  providing data for the development or testing of models of environmental change, particularly in relation to the development of models for the early detection of change.

·  providing an input from three of its sites to the GTOS demonstration project on Net Primary Productivity.

   Individual sites also undertake their own research programmes which are associated with the research priorities of the host research organisation. Information on these can be found on individual web pages, accessible through www.ecn.ac.uk/ecn.

Information management

   ECN has adopted an integrated approach to data management which aims for seamless transition from data collection to data dissemination and from data provider to data user. At the heart of ECN is a central database that integrates all data and meta-data collected under the programme (Lane 1997). Data from all network sites are sent to the ECN Central Co-ordination Unit where they are maintained under an Oracle relational database management system with links to the geographical information systems Arc/Info and Arc/View for spatial data handling. The procedures include specifications for data formats, reporting units and precisions, handling missing data, meta-information and data validation rules. Quality assurance procedures are built into all stages of data collection and data management, through quality controls embedded in the sampling protocols, data validation during processing, quality assessment exercises, and data quality ‘flags’ built into the meta-database.

Data Access Procedures

   One of ECN’s main objectives is to make its data available for research and information purposes. The aim is to have no more than a 6-month lag between data collection and the availability of validated data in the database for measurements sampled throughout the year. Annual data digests are published in hard-copy format but the ECN database can be directly accessed at three levels to meet different user requirements:

·  General-purpose database query and retrieval methods are provided primarily for scientific users already familiar with SQL and with the ECN database structures.

·  Users who require guided access to the data without prior training can examine the ECN summary database through a ‘tailored interface’ on the Web (http://www.ecn.ac.uk/ecn/). The interface enables users to build their own database query by selecting any combination of ECN Sites, Core Measurement variables and date ranges for instant generation of tables and graphs. Data may also be downloaded via E-mail for import into local software.

·  ECN also provides access to ‘real-time’ data via the Web from an automatic weather station (AWS) at the Moor House/Upper Teesdale site in the north Pennines. The AWS generates a summary dataset each hour which is transmitted via a modem link to the ECN CCU, and automatically displayed as graphs and tables on ECN’s Web site.

Data licensing

   Summary data are freely available, either from data digests or over the Internet, without the need for a licence.  Raw data are available under authorisation and licence with charges levied according to the proposed use.

Collaboration among networks

   ECN forms part of an observing hierarchy within the UK that is similar to that adopted by the Global Terrestrial Observing System (GTOS)/Global Hierarchical Observing Strategy (GHOST). At the most general level within the UK is the Institute of Terrestrial Ecology’s Land Cover Map of GB   (Barr et al 1993) which gives 100% coverage based on satellite imagery circa 1990.  At the next level comes detailed field recording (Countryside Surveys) in a sample of 1 km squares across GB at intervals of 6 to 10 years  (Barr et al 1993).  At the final level, ECN contributes detailed and continuous data from its network of 54 terrestrial and freshwater sites across the UK. ECN is also linked to thematic networks within the UK. These include: the Acid Waters Monitoring Network, DETR Air Quality Monitoring networks, DETR Ammonia Monitoring Network, Biological River Quality Surveys, Butterfly Monitoring Scheme, Chemical River Quality surveys, British Trust for Ornithology’s Common Birds Census/Breeding Bird Survey, DETR Countryside Survey 1990/2000, Forest Health Surveys, GB Harmonized Water Monitoring Scheme, Meteorological Office Weather Stations, National Vegetation Classification, River Habitat Survey, IACR Rothamsted Insect Surveys and national soil surveys (Soil Survey and Land Research Centre (SSLRC), MLURI, DANI).

            ECN is also a UK focal point for international links connected with long-term integrated monitoring and is becoming increasingly involved in international wider-scale monitoring initiatives such as the Global Terrestrial Observing System (GTOS). At a European level, ECN is involved in a project in the ENRICH programme (European Networking of Research in Global Change) - on “Networking of Long-term Integrated Monitoring in Terrestrial Systems” (NoLIMITS).  NoLIMITS is preparatory action aimed at developing an implementation plan for improved networking integrated site monitoring programmes in Europe (http://nolimits.nmw.ac.uk/). It is headed by a consortium of research organisations including ECN, the Finnish Environment Institute (which administers the Integrated Monitoring Programme) and the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, and is working with the European Environment Agency, the Centre for Earth Observation project and GTOS to ensure that plans are targeted towards the requirements of the main user communities for a continental scale network.