Signal Global Ecosystems Atlas about 58 percent complete

Summary

PBScience works with several Earth observation communities so that the Planetary Health Check rests on frequent, high-quality data for each control variable. One of these efforts, the Global Ecosystems Atlas, combines existing geospatial datasets, field observations and satellite remote sensing to show how the world's ecosystems are distributed. It aims to map 110 ecosystem types across land, sea, underground and freshwater realms at a resolution of 100 metres, using GeoAI techniques to classify ecosystems and fill gaps. When the report was written, about 58 percent of the planned global coverage was finished and work was continuing. For now the atlas shows ecosystems at a single point in time rather than change over time. The report expects that, once complete, it could become an important spatial basis for assessing ecosystem extent and for future monitoring.