Autonomy, technology and digitisation

With an increasing global population and a drive towards green growth the exploitation of marine resources in key areas such as food production and renewable energy are inevitable. Key to the sustainable exploitation of the marine environment is our ability to develop smarter monitoring, provide expert interpretation of data and deliver policy relevant science.

PML is advancing the capability of marine observing systems to provide cost-effective and timely measurements of key environmental variables that are crucial for understanding and responding to environmental change.

Critical to the ocean economy is the sustainability and productivity of the oceans which will require smarter monitoring, modelling and data-driven management. Through development and adoption of new technologies, automation and citizen science we are lowering the cost of environmental observation. This means we can record past and future change at an unprecedented scale and by making this information widely available we can improve global resilience to environmental change.

The United Nations Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development details the requirement for scientists to work with industry to develop new technologies aligned with sustainable development priorities. These priorities will require novel technologies to deliver cost effective marine data capture that is critical to delivering a complete ocean observing system. As a frontrunner in developing new marine technologies PML exercises its responsibility towards global capacity building, improving data literacy and filling data gaps.

We have strong relationships with an extensive range of commercial partners, which are considered crucial for the advancement of technology development within PML. PML chairs the Future Autonomous at Sea technologies (FAST) cluster, which is the largest marine autonomy cluster in the UK and has membership spanning the south west. This triple-helix cluster is largely comprised of industry partners complimented by leading academic organisations and government departments. The cluster exists to deliver advanced marine autonomy across numerous sectors including, offshore renewable energy, science, aquaculture and defence. The FAST cluster is also actively engaged with regulators such as the Maritime and Coastguard Agency (MCA) to work develop suitable regulations for the operation of autonomous vessels.

The Western Channel Observatory (WCO) exemplifies PML’s combined strengths in advanced in situ smart monitoring; world leading remote sensing and ecosystem modelling. The WCO also forms the backbone of Smart Sound Plymouth, which is the UK’s platform for advanced technology development, led by PML.