COMMUNICATION OF GEOSCIENCE INFORMATION FOR SOCIETAL BENEFIT AND SUSTAINABILITY – A UK VIEWPOINT

The British Geological Survey has responded to the challenge of delivering geoscience to meet societal needs through the creation of strongly user-focused derived national geospatial data-sets. These address a range of geoscience themes including ‘mainstream’ geology and resource distribution, and also a range of derived shallow geohazard data-sets including natural radon, mining, groundwater and surface flooding, landslip, swell-shrink clay, and buried karst.

Effective communication is key to exploiting the societal benefits of these data-sets and their value to sustainable and safe community development and resource management. A range of communication and delivery mechanisms is provided, from fully functional GIS to web map services that allow the user to view the data in their personal desktop environment. All data-sets can be interrogated at zip-code resolution, and information is presented to the user in non-technical language to maximise accessibility and impact. These communication methods enable users from ‘Joe Public’ through local and regional planners to national government to make informed and sustainable decisions on issues ranging from resource management to infrastructural and urban planning.

3D models are used increasingly to inform decisions on groundwater abstraction, so contributing to the sustainable management and exploitation of this precious resource. Immersive 3D visualisation is emerging as an extremely effective communication mechanism for conveying the relevance and impacts of complex geoscience to the policy-makers and decision-makers, most of whom have little or no geoscientific understanding. A strategic science shift – already underway - into multi-parameter 4D process modelling will further focus the British Geological Survey’s applied geoscience programs on sustainability issues.