Oxford Long-Term Ecology Lab

Long-Term Ecology, Biodiversity Conservation, and Environmental Stewardship Technologies

Oxford Environmental Tools are a suite of web-based systems developed from research carried out by the University of Oxford’s Long-term Ecology Lab (OxLEL).

Our goal is to harness remote sensing and web-based technologies to support: the protection of high value ecosystems; restoration of degraded habitats; and the reduction of biodiversity loss.

To achieve this we work with a wide variety of partners to develop accessible tools that are responsive to the land-use planning and management needs of business, Government and the third sector. This approach enables us to develop fit-for-purpose technologies to identify and quantify natural capital and associated ecosystem services.


Local Ecological Footprinting Tool

The LEFT Dashboard

Purpose – To provide a cost effective web-based system, using remote sensing and species databases, to generate spatial information that supports conservation and land-use planning throughout the world.

Information provided (at 30m resolution): land cover classes; number of globally threatened terrestrial vertebrate and plant species; beta-diversity of terrestrial vertebrates and plants; habitat fragmentation; wetland habitat connectivity; number of migratory species; and vegetation resilience.

LEFT helps businesses minimise the environmental impacts of their land-use activities by providing spatial data on the quality and relative scarcity of species and their associated ecosystems.

The tool automatically processes a series of high-quality datasets using standard published algorithms to produce maps at 30m resolution. These results are aggregated to produce a single map of relative ecological value that can be directly downloaded from the LEFT website.


NatureTrade life

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Purpose – A web-based platform that provides an efficient and scalable marketplace for ecosystem services.

Ecosystem Services covered (at 30m resolution): Soil erosion protection; Water flow regulation; Pollination services; Carbon storage; Recreational amenity provision.

We are working with landowners and businesses across Europe to design a web-based system that functions as a scalable market place for ‘ecosystem services’.

The platform provides web-based tools which harness remote sensing technologies to transition the concept of Payment for Ecosystem Services (PES) from the domains of academia and policy into the land management and business sectors.

NaturEtrade provides land managers with ecosystem service values for their land and thorough a secure platform enables payments to flow for the provision of these services from beneficiaries.


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