Creating an ecosystem inventory prior to exploration

Challenge ID

OTM:031

1

Title

Creating an ecosystem inventory prior to exploration

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Theme ID

ON 4.1: Environmental monitoring - Baseline historic mapping of environment and ecosystems

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Originator of Challenge

Onshore: OTM

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Challenge Reviewer / initiator

PEMEX, Statoil, Eni, Sasol, Exxon, Tullow, Petronas, Chevron

General description

Overview of Challenge

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What is the nature of the challenge? (What is not adequately addressed at present?)

Continuous, unbiased and consistent environmental data is difficult to obtain in some areas. 

We are required to develop an ecosystem inventory as part of our baseline environmental assessment to allow us to track and quantify any changes during our operations.

- high to very high resolution land cover (habitats)

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Thematic information requirements

3. Obtain detailed vegetation information,  4. Obtain detailed land-use information,   6. Identify inland water bodies and determine water quality,     10. Fauna and presence and patterns,

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Nature of the challenge - What effect does this challenge have on operations?

Obtaining baseline information over a large area is  time consuming and expensive.  We must ground survey parts of the area, but this can lead to bias or unrepresentative results because there is a tendency to target the most important or 'environmentally

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What do you currently do to address this challenge?/ How is this challenge conventionally addressed?

A number of continuous monitoring sites are established where  remote monitoring devices are deployed and samples are recorded at regular intervals. Information can be interpreted and inferred from these results, but they only record localised changes and

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What kind of solution do you envisage could address this challenge?

High to very high resolution land cover products based on EO data

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What is your view on the capability of technology to meet this need? – are you currently using EO tech? If not, why not?

EO could be a useful complimentary technology

Challenge classification

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Lifecycle stage

Pre license

Exp.

Dev.

Prod.

Decom.

Score from impact quantification [1]

3

4

0

0

0

12

Climate classification

NOT CLIMATE SPECIFIC

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Geographic context/restrictions

Generic onshore (Unspecified)

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Topographic classification / Offshore classification

Generic onshore (Unspecified)

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Seasonal variations

Any season

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Impact Area

Environmental

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Technology Urgency

(How quickly does the user need the solution)

Immediately (0-2 years)

Information requirements

18

Update frequency

depending on sensor and application

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Data Currently used

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Spatial resolution

21

Thematic accuracy

80-90%

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Example formats

Standardized geo-spatial formats (e.g. shapefile, geotiff or KML)

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Timeliness

Reference data - timeliness not important

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Geographic Extent

25

Existing standards