Scottish space projects tackling climate change to share in £7 million funding

Two Scottish space projects are among 11 UK schemes awarded a share of £7 million of government funding to tackle climate change and predict global disasters using satellites.

The School of Geosciences at the University of Edinburgh, GLAMIS, is receiving funds from the UK Space Agency to create a system capable of mapping global topography, alongside Craft Prospect, based in Glasgow, which will use the funds to demonstrate technologies for future secure telecommunication systems supported by artificial intelligence.

Science minister George Freeman said: “Satellites in space are helping us solve some of the most significant challenges we face, from climate change to cyber attacks, and through the National Space Strategy we are putting the UK at the forefront of unleashing these innovations.

“Whether it's monitoring greenhouse gas emissions or supporting increased tree planting, this new funding will take game-changing ideas from the UK space sector and our brilliant scientists, and turn them into reality.”

Space technology is seen as a key part of the fight against climate change.

The funding, announced on Tuesday as the COP26 climate talks continue in Glasgow, comes from the UK Space Agency's National Space Innovation Programme.

The majority of the projects across the UK focus on climate change or environmental management, with others designed to secure telecommunication systems and protect digital infrastructure against cyber attacks.

The Craft Prospect project, The Responsive Operations for Key Services (ROKS) mission, will demonstrate technologies for future secure telecommunication systems using Quantum Key Distribution (QKD) and supported by artificial intelligence.

In-orbit operation will be demonstrated by next year by ROKS, which will be handed £869,769 from the fund.

GLAMIS will receive £300,846 for its project, which will focus on increasing coverage through increasing laser wavelength stability and signal processing.

This £7m in funding is in addition to a further £7m provided last year that was to support the projects through their development phase.

Scotland recently unveiled plans to become a centre for space tourism and take a £4 billion share of the global space market.

The Scottish Space Strategy, which aims to create 20,000 jobs in the sector by 2030, sets out plans to develop a network of satellite launch sites, pursue green technologies and build on existing strengths in data analysis and research.

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