GIS

Development of national heat network zoning model

Arup and Ordnance Survey (OS) have hit a major milestone in the roll-out of national heat networks in England with a major update to the national heat zoning model. The model will support at least ten English towns and cities to begin establishing their heat network zones later this year, with further zones to follow.

Arup, a global engineering and sustainability development consultancy, and OS were first appointed as consultants by the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ) in 2024 under the Heat Network Zoning Consultancy Framework to provide technical and consulting services to help identify and develop heat network zones in England.

As part of the framework, they have been working on the design and management of the national heat zoning model, which helps decide where large, low-carbon heat networks should be built across England. The model is underpinned by OS building and address data, which provides the core inputs for assessing heat network development costs, alongside OS roads and rivers data. Accurate building classification data is critical to the model, as it informs heat demand assumptions and improves the reliability of outputs. The potential use of the OS National Geographic Database (OS NGD) is also being evaluated, with potential value in new building attribution and more comprehensive site-level data. www.arup.com

New era of Earth Intelligence from space

Satellites have watched Earth for decades. In that time, they’ve accumulated a staggering archive of images. Yet, faced with intractable datasets and cloudcovered images, scientists have struggled to convert the massive data troves into actionable insights about the planet.

That has changed with Tessera, an artificial intelligence model that distils millions of images captured by European Space Agency satellites into a format that is easily used by researchers. The model has been developed by a team led by the University of Cambridge. The software can be used to reveal crop patterns, habitat loss, deforestation, and even environmental impacts of conflict, said Srinivasan Keshav, professor at the Department of Computer Science and Technology and one of Tessera’s lead investigators.

Tessera is a type of generalized AI known as a foundation model. As it churns through petabytes of satellite data, it learns to recognise patterns and how they change over time. It also fills in missing values for cloud-covered images. The result is an uninterpreted sequence of 128 numbers for every 10-by-10- metre area of land. www.cst.cam.ac.uk

LYNRED launches SPIRIT

LYNRED, AIM and EXOSENS, Europe’s three leading suppliers of infrared detectors, have decided to join forces under the SPIRIT project, a strategic European initiative designed to further develop the fundamental technology building blocks for the next generation of infrared sensors. www.lynred.com

KONGSBERG accelerates seabed mapping

KONGSBERG and the Ocean Exploration Trust (OET) are set to dive deeper than ever before in a new expedition to map vast areas of previously unexplored seafloor in the Central Pacific.

The Pacific Mapping (NA178) expedition, running 10–24 June, sees OET Exploration Vessel Nautilus deploying KONGSBERG’s EM 304 MKII multibeam echo sounder for the first time. Three KONGSBERG engineers will be embedded aboard Nautilus for the full 14 days, using the mission as a critical real-world testing platform for advancing multibeam technology and helping to raise standards across the global mapping community

Despite covering more than 70% of the planet, huge swathes of the ocean remain uncharted at high resolution. The challenge is particularly acute in deep ocean environments, where access, cost and technical limitations typically constrain survey efforts. The EM 304 MKII is designed to tackle these pain points head-on. Capable of operating at full ocean depth, it combines wide swath coverage with consistently high resolution, enabling survey teams to map larger areas more efficiently without compromising data quality. www.kongsberg.com

Kalogiannakis elected FIG president

Michalis Kalogiannakis of Greece has been elected president of the International Federation of Surveyors (FIG) for the 2027 to 2030 term, following a vote held at the XXVIII FIG Congress in Cape Town, South Africa. In a separate vote, Qingdao, China secured the right to host the XXIX FIG Congress in 2030.

Esri’s Jack Dangermond receive award from IFCE

At the 2026 Shanghai Green Development Innovation Summit Forum, the International Fund for China’s Environment (IFCE) recognized Esri president Jack Dangermond with the 30 Years of International Green Development Influential Figures Award. Created to coincide with IFCE’s 30th anniversary, the award is presented to leaders who have made outstanding achievements in addressing climate change and advancing sustainable development over the past 30 years. esri.com

Taoglas launches ultra-compact dualband high-precision GNSS antenna

Taoglas has launched the GVLB208 series, an active and passive dual-band GNSS L1/L5 stacked patch antenna. Combining a tiny package with concurrent L1/L5 support and stable right-hand circular polarization (RHCP), the antennas deliver reliable centimeterlevel positioning in a compact 20 x 20 x 8 mm footprint. www.taoglas.com