Classification Scheme Manual - Science and Technology ... · finding needles in the haystack It is...
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The Envirobase Classification Scheme Manual Previously issued as The ERFF Research Classification Scheme Manual Issue 3 - November 2012 David + Marion Bartholomew
Transcript of Classification Scheme Manual - Science and Technology ... · finding needles in the haystack It is...
The Envirobase Classification Scheme Manual
Previously issued as The ERFF Research Classification Scheme Manual
Issu
e 3
- N
ovem
ber
2012
David + Marion Bartholomew
Living With Environmental Change (LWEC)Polaris House
North Star AvenueSwindonSN2 1EU
Tel: 01793 411583Email: [email protected]
A brief history of Envirobase
In 2002 the Environment Research Funders’ Forum (ERFF) brought together the major UK public funders of environmental research with the aim of maximising the coherence and effectiveness of environmental research funding. The ERFF Research Classification Scheme was designed so that information on environmental research projects funded by members of the Forum could be held in a single database and classified on a consistent basis which would enable analysis of overall spend on different areas of work and facilitate the identification of gaps and overlaps. The database was called the ERFF Research Database.
In 2010 ERFF merged with the Living With Environmental Change programme and the Global Environmental Change Committee, bringing together 22 major UK public sector funders and users of environmental research to align strategic and delivery activities more effectively under one partnership, which continued under the name Living With Environmental Change (LWEC). The ERFF Research Database changed its name to the Environmental Research Database and continued as an LWEC activity and resource.
In 2011 information on observational activities and programmes collated by the UK Environmental Observation Framework (UK-EOF) were added to the database and it was relaunched, with additional facilities, as Envirobase; the ERFF Research Classification Scheme has now been renamed the Envirobase Classification Scheme (but is otherwise unchanged). Envirobase is publicly available from its website www.envirobase.info and the information it contains can be searched, inspected and downloaded free of charge. More information about LWEC can be found on the LWEC website at www.lwec.org.uk .
1INTRODUCTION
1 IntroductIonEnvirobase1 is a compilation of information about over 22,000 (and rising) UK environmental research and observation projects, activities and programmes2 carried out from public funds or by volunteers. Some of this information is available from individual funders, but Envirobase makes it far more accessible and useful by bringing it all together and providing powerful search tools.
The database has been created to help get better value from the UK’s investment in environmental research. In particular, it can help funders with:
strategic analysis — broad-brush analysis of research z
activity to help high-level resource allocation
programme planning — similar but more z
detailed analysis within specific topic areas
researchers with:
project planning and research in progress — z
identifying relevant prior work, sources of data, potential collaborators etc
and funders, researchers and research customers with:
knowledge transfer and public engagement — z
making it easier for users of research results in government, think tanks, industry and the media to locate relevant knowledge and expertise.
finding needles in the haystack
It is a step forward in itself to collect information about so much of the UK’s environmental research in one place, but that would have limited value without an effective way to find content of interest — the database would be much like the Web before the advent of search tools like Google.
Envirobase has two search tools. The simpler one works much like Google, searching for chosen words in the database, and shares Google’s strengths and weaknesses. It is easy to use and often useful, but it relies on project descriptions
1 www.envirobase.info2 all colloquially referred to as ‘research’ (for research or observation) and ‘projects’ (for projects, activities or programmes) in this manual
including the word(s) the searcher expects, and they may not; even a spelling mistake can make a project effectively invisible. To overcome this limitation, projects in the database are all having summaries of their key features added by human interpreters. Essentially sets of sophisticated keywords, these are stored in the database as alphanumeric codes and provide the basis for an ‘advanced’ search tool which is more powerful and more reliable than the simple text search tool. This is the better choice for many database users.
what’s in this manual
This manual is aimed at two groups of people:
the ‘ z coders’ who add the key feature summaries to the project descriptions in the database, and
users z who want to make the most of the database, whether in research planning, in the course of academic or industrial research, or as a way to find expertise or evidence to use in policy-making or journalism.
If you are a coder, it is both the ‘set text’ for training and a reference to keep at hand while coding. This is a skilled and demanding task, and if users are to get the best from the database it needs to be done to a consistently high standard.
If you are a user, the manual is background reading that will help you get the best from the database. It is not a step-by-step guide; the search interface is designed to be self-explanatory.
The pdf version is bookmarked to make key information available with a single click.
Chapter 2 The coding scheme explains how the codes describe projects, and what information they convey about the work. This is essential reading both for coders and for anyone who wants to use the full power of the advanced search tool.
Chapter 3 Coding projects is a more detailed guide to the coding scheme and the coding process, principally for coders.
Annexes A and B provide more detail about aspects of the scheme, and the whole scheme is tabulated in annex C.
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3
background
Devising an effective coding scheme is time-consuming, and coding projects is even more so. Why bother?
the limitations of text search
The weakness of text search is that its effective-ness depends on the specific words funders use to describe their projects. The descriptions (often quoting researchers) vary widely in style and detail, sometimes use different terms for the same thing, can be cryptic (so that understanding requires expert judgment, and even informed guesswork), often bury details of the actual work in a long discussion of its context and potential value (which frequently contains irrelevant words, and leads to ‘false positives’ in search results), and not infre-quently have a scattering of typos. Occasionally, the only description is the project title.
With database content like this, finding even a majority of projects on a particular topic using text search can require multiple searches, followed by amalgamation of the hit lists and manual removal of duplicates and false positives. Even an experienced user of text search can miss important projects, with potentially significant consequences. Analysis of research activity for strategic and programme planning, which usually involves identifying work on numerous different topics, is particularly labour-intensive.
The addition of a key feature summary to project descriptions, based on expert interpretation of the original text and in a consistent format, goes a long way towards overcoming these problems and makes searching and analysis much quicker and more reliable in most circumstances.
Code-based search is not, though, a panacea. Text search can still be a better choice for ‘quick-and-dirty’ and highly specific searches. And code-based search cannot achieve its potential without a well-designed coding scheme, knowledgeable, skilful and diligent coders, and users who under-stand how it works.
why not just keywords?
Keywords — descriptive words or phrases from a standard list which can be attached to items in a database — can go some way towards overcoming the limitations of simple text search. They are widely used, familiar, and easy to understand, so why are they not used in Envirobase?
The answer is that they become increasingly unmanageable for both keyworders and database users as the range of topics in the database and the variety of uses grow.
Envirobase includes work on everything from diseases of bees, computer models of fluid flow and the psychology of car drivers to the Water Framework Directive, the economics of wind turbines, geological surveys and the organisation of workshops. It would be impracticable to make all the distinctions that are desirable using an ordinary, unstructured set of keywords.
In this situation a branching hierarchy of ‘keywords’, with a list of broad topics at the top, each divided into sub-topics and so on to make increasingly detailed distinctions, can be both more effective and easier to use. Two or more separate hierarchies (‘dimensions’) can be used if necessary to describe independent characteristics. The ‘keywords’ in systems like this are conventionally called ‘classes’, ‘categories’ or (particularly in scientific contexts) ‘taxa’, and the whole system a ‘classification scheme’ or ‘taxonomy’. The Linnaean taxonomy for animals and plants is a familiar (one-dimensional) example.
A disadvantage of traditional classification schemes like the Linnaean is that the names of individual classes rarely show where they fit into the hierarchy. They can also be inconveniently long. Both of these problems can be avoided by replacing the words with alphanumeric codes. Libraries, for example, use the numeric Dewey decimal clas-sification system in which books on science have codes beginning with 5, on physics with 53, and on magnetism with 538, and successively finer distinc-tions are made by further digits after a decimal point. Dewey codes show immediately where a book can be found on library shelves — and they are short enough to fit on the spine, and remember.
2 the codIng scheme
THE CODING SCHEmE
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THE CODING SCHEmE
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Classes in Envirobase have alphanumeric codes as well as their full names for similar reasons, and (like librarians used to Dewey decimal codes) experienced users often find it more convenient to refer to classes by their codes than by their names — hence the use of the terms ‘coding scheme’, ‘coding’ and ‘coders’ in this manual interchange-ably with ‘classification scheme’ and its derivatives.
basic design principles
Other things being equal, the more discriminating a classification scheme the more complex it becomes, the more skill it demands of both database users and coders, the harder it becomes to maintain the quality of coding, and the more labour-intensive — and so the more expensive — the coding process. Eventually, further increases in discrimination and sophistication become counter-productive. A balance has to be struck.
Some qualities, though, are fundamental. The Envirobase hierarchy has been carefully designed:
to be z clear and logical, and so be as easy as possible for coders and users to understand
to be z complete, enabling all programmes and projects within LWEC’s purview to be given one or more meaningful codes in every dimension
to have as far as possible z mutually-exclusive classes and dimensions in order to minimise ambiguity and uncertainty
to be z appropriately granular, making finer distinctions in fields where there is a high level of research interest than in those where there is little. The aim is to present database users with hit lists of manageable length that err on the side of inclusiveness, accepting that some will include a minority of irrelevant projects.
to be z extensible, allowing finer distinctions to be added in future, or for special purposes, without invalidating existing codes
to z meet the needs of a wide range of users, not just specialists. For example, class names avoid technical language wherever this is possible without unacceptable sacrifice of precision.
scope
We have seen that Envirobase includes an enormous variety of research. But exactly what is its scope? What, in fact, does LWEC regard as ‘environmental research’?
An environment is by definition a context within which something exists. In LWEC’s case, the ‘something’ is man and anything we have made or brought into being, such as buildings, computers, farm animals, or laws, and the environment is the natural world. ‘Environmental’ research is therefore work concerned either with the natural world or with our interaction with it — how our activities affect (or could affect) it, and how it affects (or could affect) us, directly or indirectly.
Research on man himself (medical research, for example) and on buildings, computers, farm animals and so on is not ‘environmental’ unless it is focuses on an interaction with the natural world that has significant consequences for one side or the other. Research on basic sciences such as physics and chemistry is not considered environmental, either.
Figure 1 summarises this graphically.
structure
With such a wide and varied range of work to describe the coding scheme is inevitably complex. It has four core dimensions — Human Domain, Environmental Domain, EPICS (Earth, Pressures, Impacts, Consequences and Solutions) and Geography — and two others (Frascati and Primary Purpose) which are independent and included largely for compatibility with official statistics. There are over 460 codes and sub-codes in total, in hierarchies up to 4 levels deep.
Every project has at least one code in each of the six dimensions; most have more in some of them.
how codes describe projects
The codes given to a project from the four core dimensions mean little individually, but together they can add up to a rich description. They could, for example, show that it is developing a computer model of the risk to woodland from extreme winds, designed to be used by the forestry industry.
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In that example describing the actual work makes its purpose self-evident and it is clear how the results will be used, but that is not always the case. Many projects just add to the sum of human knowledge with no certainty that the results will be used at all, let alone how. Others have a specific purpose, but their results have wider relevance, too. Observing wading birds as an input to a tidal barrage impact assessment might, for example, produce results useful in research on estuary ecology, pollution, and other topics. Coding for a project like this could summarise what is actually done (observing birds), its original context (tidal energy), other possible uses of the results, or a combination of those.
Coding in Envirobase focuses on the actual work done in a project because this is the most certain and unambiguous information about it, and it provides the most effective basis for searches.
However, when projects do have a clear and specific purpose it can be helpful to know that as well. Adding information about the context of work can also help to avoid the anomaly that a summary of a complex project such as a barrage impact assessment funded as a single project would be quite different from the summaries of its parts if they were funded as separate projects.
To enable contextual information to be included without creating ambiguities, false positives, and false negatives (how many ecologists would think of searching for projects on tidal energy?) the coding scheme provides for both primary and secondary codes. Primary codes are used to describe the actual activity in a project, and context is indicated by secondary codes where appropriate.
Secondary codes are also used more generally as ‘qualifiers’ — essentially adjectives — to make the primary coding more specific.
In the wading bird example above:
primary codes would identify it as field z
observation of birds in England
a qualifying secondary would show that the z
observations were in a river estuary
another secondary would show that the work z
was done in the context of tidal energy.
frascati and primary purpose
The Frascati classification scheme is used interna-tionally for compiling statistics on research activity, and the UK also compiles statistics using ‘primary purpose’ classifications. These are included in the Envirobase scheme largely for compatibility; they are irrelevant for most database users, and have little relationship to the four core dimensions. They have six and seven codes respectively, and no sub-codes.
The Frascati codes (A1 - A6) were originally devised with the development of military equipment in mind, and indicate its progression through the stages of R&D from ‘pure basic research’ to ‘experimental development’. Not surprisingly, it can be difficult to classify environmental research on this basis. The codes are defined, and interpreted in terms more appropriate for environmental research (insofar as this is possible), in Annex A.
Primary Purpose codes (B1 - B7) are relevant only to government-funded research (as all the work in Envirobase is) and distinguish between the various purposes of funding from a government point of view. B1, for example, is ‘general support’ for academic research, B2 is funding for ‘govern-ment services’ such as pollution control, B3 funding for ‘policy support’ and so on. Definitions and an interpretation of their use in the Envirobase context are given in Annex B.
human domain
Environmental research has historically focused on understanding the natural world itself, but in the past few years concern about pollution, the depletion of natural resources and above all climate change has prompted a major redirection of funding towards study of human interaction with the natural world and the search for ways to live in it more sustainably.
Much of this interaction is negative at the moment: we damage the environment, it bites back with floods, ill-health and crop failure, and natural events such as earthquakes cause havoc, too. But an increasing amount is positive: we are also restoring habitats, recycling rare minerals, reducing our carbon emissions, and using green spaces to improve our lives.
THE CODING SCHEmE
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To characterise research on human interaction with the environment the coding scheme needs to identify who is doing the interacting, or influencing it: which industry or what aspect of human society is causing environmental change (good or bad), or being affected by it or by natural hazards. That is done by the Human Domain codes C1 - C13, and a total of 84 sub-codes in 2 further levels which make finer distinctions — the codes in each level subsets of their parent.
There are still, of course, many projects concerned purely with the natural world itself. These are given a ‘pass-through’ code (C1, ‘The natural world’) to satisfy the rule requiring projects to have a code in every dimension.
The next eleven Human Domain codes, C2 - C12, and their sub-codes correspond to aspects of human life. Ten of these are essentially sectors of industry and commerce — from ‘Agriculture, horticulture, forestry & land mangement’ (C2) through ‘Utilities & related public services’ (C6) to ‘Transport’ (C9) and ‘Public, education & health sectors’ (C11) — and the eleventh is ‘Private households’ (C12).
These codes are designed to group together people whose activities interact with the environment in broadly similar ways, and who can be influenced through similar regulations, trade associations, journals and other channels.
sector overlaps
There are inevitably some overlaps between the activities of the various sectors which could lead to uncertainty about which code is appropriate. Buildings are the most obvious example: all sectors use them, and they have their own ‘Construction|buildings’code (C8.1)1. All sectors use transport, too, and this has its own codes ‘Transport’ (C9), and ‘Extractive & manufacturing industries|engineering manufacture’ (C7.5, which includes vehicle manufacture). In cases like these the general rule is that coding identifies the sector which controls the interaction with the environ-ment that is being investigated.
1 References to sub-codes are shown with | between levels; ‘Construction|buildings’ refers to the ‘buildings’ sub-code (C8.1) of ‘Construction’ (C8).
Research on designing buildings to be more energy-efficient, for example, is therefore coded ‘Construction|buildings’ because design is controlled largely by the construction industry, whereas work on how their occupants can use heating and lighting more efficiently is coded according to the occupant.
In a similar way, the design of vehicles is coded ‘Extractive & manufacturing industries|engineering manufacture’, but its use is not.
The end users of transport generally have less influence on how efficiently vehicles are operated than users of buildings because, with the exception of private cars, transport is usually provided as a service by airlines, train operators hauliers and so on, and it is they who are in control. All their customers can do is decide whether to travel, and which mode to use. Research on transport in use, therefore, typically focuses on the operators rather than the end users, and is coded by industry as ‘Transport|road’, ‘..|rail’, ‘..|sea’ or ‘..|air’ as appropriate. When work does focus on end users — looking, for example, at how commuters decide whether to drive or use a train — they are identi-fied by a second primary code.
cross-sector and indirect interactions
Individual sector codes work well for characterising direct, physical interactions between particular activities and the natural world — catching fish, releasing nitrates into rivers, building flood defences and so on — which are principally associated with one or two particular sectors. It would take incon-veniently many, though, to use individual sector codes for describing research on interactions that are common to several, such as carbon emissions, or work on complex interactions that are associated with aspects of society rather than specific activities, such as rural affairs and economic development.
In addition, not all research is concerned with direct interactions: many projects focus on aspects of human life such as psychology and law-making that only interact indirectly with the natural world by exerting an influence on behaviour. Some work, such as developing instruments for use in future environmental research, and disseminating research results, has an even more indirect effect.
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The human dimension of work like this is charac-terised by the last Human Domain code ‘Cross-sector & indirect’ (C13) and its sub-codes.
Sector (C2 - C12 family) and indirect (C13 family) codes are used together where appropriate to show how an indirect influence would feed through into a physical interaction. Research on fishing quotas, for example, would have a C13.9 ‘government policy & services’ primary code and a C3 ‘fishing & aquaculture’ secondary code.
environmental domain
The most important information about research on the natural world and on human interactions with it is which aspect(s) of the natural world and its behaviour is involved. This is described by eight Environmental Domain codes D1 - D8 and their sub-codes: the ‘Earth system’ (D1, with 6 sub-codes), ‘Lithosphere’ (D2, with 25), ‘Hydrosphere’ (D3, with 20), ‘Atmosphere’ (D4, with 6), ‘Biosphere’ (D5, with 22), ‘Space’ (D6), ‘Natural Hazards’ (D7, with 11 sub-codes), and ‘Cross-domain’ research (D8). D9 ‘The non-natural world’ is a pass-through code for research on scientific equipment, industrial processes and products, public policy and so on, analagous to the C1 pass-through code in the Human Domain dimension.
Like the Human Domain codes, the Environmental Domain codes have been chosen to reflect natural similarities in the subjects of research and the way people think rather than make traditional academic distinctions. The use of most of them is self-evident, but some aspects call for further comment.
cross-cutting systems
Recent environmental research has shown that the natural world is much less compartmentalised than used to be thought, and research is increas-ingly cutting across traditional disciplines. This is recognised in the ‘Earth system’ (D1) codes. At the moment these include separate codes only for the climate system and its major sub-systems such as the carbon and water cycles, but further codes are likely to be added in future as research expands on other major systems.
These codes are used only for work on complete systems, or (with other appropriate codes) on the way that individual components such as atmosphere dynamics or plants contribute to them. Research on components in other contexts does not have ‘Earth system’ codes.
water/ground, water/air and ground/air interfaces
Research is often concerned with the interfaces between air, water and the ground; they are important, for example, in the water and carbon cycles, in weather, in erosion, in flooding, and (in the water/ground case) as a habitat.
In the Envirobase coding scheme, both the water and the surface solids in water/ground interfaces, including margins up to the mean high tide mark, are treated as part of the hydrosphere and have D3 family codes such as D3.2.4, ‘seabed’. Solids in suspension are treated as part of the water itself.
Lithosphere (D2) codes are used only for under-lying rock etc, dry land above the mean high tide mark, and for sea or river bed material that has been removed from the water, such as building aggregates dredged from the seabed.
Interactions between the air and water or land have an Atmosphere family code, D4.4 ‘atmosphere-surface interaction’. This is normally accompanied by an appropriate hydrosphere or lithosphere code.
Using codes as qualifiers
Environmental Domain codes are frequently used as qualifiers, and some biosphere codes are provided principally to be used in this way.
Qualifiers are most often used to show where a plant or animal lives: work on freshwater fish, for example, would have a D3.1 ‘freshwater’ secondary code to qualify its D5.2.3 ‘fish’ primary code.
The codes used principally as qualifiers are ‘cellular & genetic level’ (D5.3), ‘habitats’ (D5.4), ‘ecosystems (biomes), ecology & biodiversity’ (D5.5), ‘animals & plants used as food’ (D5.6) and ‘animals & plants exploited commercially for uses other than food’ (D5.7). These are also used occasionally on their own as primary codes.
THE CODING SCHEmE
9
epics
It is only a slight simplification to say that the surge of interest in and research on human interaction with the environment was prompted by a growing recognition that we are damaging our planet, with serious consequences for our future, and we need to do something about it. Codes in the EPICS dimension — Earth, Pressures, Impacts, Consequences & Solutions — relate research to this chain of events.
The codes are collated in one dimension because most research projects focus on just one link in the E-P-I-C-S chain, though some (particularly projects commissioned by government depart-ments and agencies) include elements of two or more. Most projects, therefore, need primary code(s) from only one of the five links to describe them effectively, though they can have codes from two or more if necessary.
Projects may also have secondary codes from other links, used as qualifiers, to make their coding more informative. Research on flood risk in coastal towns, for example, might have a secondary ‘changes in sea levels’ Impact code (E3.1.3.4) as well as a ‘consequences for the built environment & human life|danger & damage from flooding’ (E4.3.1) primary code.
earth
To understand our interactions with the environ-ment, we need first to understand the natural world itself. The focus of research on the science of the natural world is described by Environmental Domain (D) and Geography (D) codes, and the Earth (E1) codes in EPICS describe what kind of research it is: ‘understanding the behaviour of natural entities, processes & systems’ (E1.1), ‘field observation of the environment’ (E1.2), and ‘forecasting, hindcasting & developing scenarios’ (E1.3).
pressures
The Pressures (E2) codes are used to classify human activities which have significant unin-tended — and usually harmful — effects on the environment: ‘depletion of limited natural
resources’ (E2.1, with 9 sub-codes), ‘polluting activities’ (E2.2, with 23 sub-codes) and ‘interven-tion in natural processes’ — activities such as genetic modification and changes to land drainage — (E2.3, with 5 sub-codes).
The aim of research on pressures is typically to understand these activities and (usually in separate, later projects) work out how to reduce or reverse the damage they cause. Activities which are intended to be beneficial, such as reforestation to capture carbon, are normally coded as ‘Solutions’ rather than pressures.
Polluting activities are described by pairs of codes from two sub-families called‘facets’, E2.2.A.1 - 22 and E2.2.B.1 - 9. Facets are used where something is best described by two or three independent attributes: in the case of polluting activities, facet A ‘type of pollution’ and facet B ‘source of pollution’. Faceted codes must be used in sets, with at least one from each facet; if any are primaries, there must be at least one primary from every facet. This is enforced by the coding software.
The parent code (E2.2) is used on its own for work on polluting activities when both the type and source of the pollution are mixed or unknown.
Facets are also used in the ‘Solutions’ part of the classification scheme.
impacts
Impacts (E3) codes characterise changes in the natural world, many of them caused by these pressures and others by natural processes. Anthropogenic pressures, of course, often trigger a chain of changes, and there is no clear line between the two. Again, most but not all are undesirable.
‘Impacts on the climate, land, water & air’ (E3.1) is a family of 31 sub-codes in three levels, allowing quite fine distinctions to be made. ‘Impacts on flora & fauna’ (E3.2) is a family of 9 sub-codes, in two levels. ‘Short-term impacts’ (E3.3) is a qualifier included to allow these — effects of storms and droughts that last only for months or a few years, for example — to be distinguished from long-term changes such as sea-level rise.
10
consequences
Consequences (E4) codes identify the effects that changes in the natural environment (‘impacts’) and natural hazards such as earthquakes have on man. A family of 38 sub-codes distinguishes conse-quences for non-food material resources such as minerals and timber (E4.1, with 5 sub-codes), food & water supplies (E4.2, with 6), the built environ-ment & human life — grouped together because they are threatened by the same violent physical events, such as floods and extreme winds — (E4.3, with 9), human health (E4.4, with 6), and wealth and quality of life (E4.5, with 4); the final group (E4.6, with 2 sub-codes) covers projects investi-gating multiple consequences, such as the various different effects of climate change.
solutions
‘Solutions’ are activities intended to improve man’s relationship with the natural world: to reduce future or reverse past damage to it, to improve it, to mitigate the effect environmental problems have on us, or to help us to benefit more from nature. The three facets of the Solutions (E5) codes describe their purpose (facet A), their technical nature (facet B), and the route by which they might be imple-mented (facet C). Facet A has three sub-codes, facet B has 80 — a reflection of the very wide range of technologies, approaches and measures being investigated — and facet C has 12.
mixed projects
Some projects are concerned with several pressures, impacts, consequences and/or solutions, which may or may not be identified clearly enough to be given separate codes. Even when they are identifiable, the work done on each in projects like this is often too little to justify coding them individually. A dedicated code, E6, is provided for mixed projects like these.
projects enabling future research
The final EPICS code, E7, covers funding for the development of scientific equipment or research methods, or otherwise enabling future environmental research, and for the exploitation of research, for example by running a university/industry network. The specific activity is usually identified by accompanying primary codes from the ‘Human Domain|cross-sector & indirect|scientific equipment & methods’ (C13.10) or ‘..|enabling & exploitation of research’ (C13.11) families of codes.
E7 is the only EPICS primary code used for projects which are purely enabling, and produce no original knowledge about the natural world, pressures, impacts, consequences or solutions. Projects which both produce original knowledge and develop facilities or methods which will enable a range of future research have both an E7 and other appropriate EPICS primary codes.
Figure 2: epics summary
epics codes in family
describe
earth E1 how we develop the science of the natural worldpressures E2 things we do to the natural worldimpacts E3 Impacts these have on (ie changes they cause in) the natural world (and other
impacts that result from natural hazards)
consequences E4 Consequences these impacts have for us (and other consequences that result from natural hazards)
solutions E5 Solutions we are seeking to adverse impacts and consequences (and other work to improve the environment, and help us benefit from it)
mixed E6 projects concerned with several pressures, impacts, consequences and/or solutions
enabling E7 projects which enable future research
THE CODING SCHEmE
11
Figure 3: The core dimeNsioNs
human domain
environmental domain
epics geography
earth pressures impacts consequences solutionsC D E1 E2 E3 E4 E5 G
human world
human world
human world
human world
natural world
natural world
natural world
natural world
Research purely on the science of the natural world – how it works, what state it is in – is described by D, E1, sometimes E3, and G codes.
Research on human interaction with the natural world is described on the human side by C and either E2, E4 or E5 codes, and on the natural world side by D and, when appropriate, one or more E1, E3 and/or G codes.
The E6 (mixed projects) and E7 (enabling projects) codes have been omitted from this table for clarity.
geography
The Geography (G) codes are provided principally to identify the location of work which is specifically associated with particular continents, regions, oceans, seas or climatic zones. The association must be quite clear and explicit for these location codes to be used: the work must involve field measurements, computer modelling of a specific place, be concerned with public policy, industrial activity or the enabling or exploitation of research in a specific country, or have another similarly specific link to place. Work on flora, fauna or natural processes which is not linked to a specific place — developing a model of volcanic processes or water flow over rough ground, for example — is not given location codes.
‘Continents and regions’ (G2) is subdivided into 22 sub-codes, ‘Oceans & seas’ (G3) into 25 and ‘Climatic zones (G4) into 2. The UK and its surrounding waters are more finely subdivided than other parts of the world, for obvious reasons, using about a quarter of all the location codes.
Other codes are provided for research concerned with the global scale, such as the climate system, and space (G1), and for ‘non-geographic’ work which has no specific locational associations (G6). This includes, for example, most research on basic physical, chemical, biological, social or economic processes (when no field measurements or other location-specific elements are involved), work on
types of topography, ecology etc that spans several countries (again when no field measurements or other location-specific elements are involved), on scientific equipment and research methods (unless they are tailored for a location-specific context such as use by a UK government agency), and research on industrial products that are traded internationally.
The climatic zone codes are intended to be used mainly as secondaries, qualifying continental codes such as ‘South America’ or codes such as ‘natural forest’ from other parts of the classifica-tion scheme, but may also be used as primaries.
The ‘Specific location(s)’ code (G5), is used only as a secondary qualifier, to indicate that work is based on a specific location within a larger region (identified by a G2 or G3 primary code), such as monitoring or modelling of a specific river or the environmental policies of a specific city.
core dimensions summary
Figures 3, 4 and 5 show how the four core dimensions work together to describe projects. Essentially, Human Domain codes identify a part of the human world, Environmental Domain codes a part of the natural world, Geography codes where that is on the planet (if it has a specific location), and the EPICS codes describe interac-tions between the human and natural worlds.
Figure 6 gives a worked example.
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Figure 5: how codes describe research oN maN’s iNTeracTioN wiTh The NaTural
world
dimension codes in family describehuman domain C who is interacting (strictly, what aspect of human life is involved)
Examples: fishing, road transport, economics & markets
environmental domain D which part of the natural world (If none, the pass-through code D9)Examples: deep oceans, fish
epics: earth E1 if research on the natural world, what kind it isExamples: theory, field observations, forecasting
pressures E2 if a (usually damaging) activity, what it isExamples: depleting mineral resources, emitting NOx & SOx
impacts E3 if a change in the natural world, what kind of changeExamples: change in sea levels, change in biodiversity
consequences E4 if a (usually harmful) consequence for us, what is affectedExamples: food & water supplies, health, prosperity
solutions
for the natural world (reducing adverse impacts)
for us (reducing adverse consequences)
E5.A.1 or E5.A.2+
E5.B.1, 3 or 4
E5.A.3+
E5.B.1, 2 or 5-8
if a solution, what it aims to achieve (e5a), what it involves (e5b), and who will implement it (e5c)Examples:Prevention or reduction of future damage to the environment, by reduction of pollution at source, by commerce or industry (E5.A.1 + E5.B.3)
Mitigation of effect on man, by improving water use efficiency & demand management, by government regulation (E5.A.3 + E5.B.5)
geography G where on the planet (if anywhere in particular)Examples: England, the Indian Ocean
Figure 4: how codes describe research oN The NaTural world
dimension codes in
family
describe
environmental domain D which part of the natural worldExamples: deep oceans, fish
epics: earth E1 what kind of research it isExamples: theory, field observations, forecasting
impacts E3 if a change in the natural world, what kind of changeExamples: change in sea levels, change in biodiversity
geography G where on the planet (if anywhere in particular)Examples: England, the Indian Ocean
.... with the pass-through code C1 in the Human Domain.
THE CODING SCHEmE
13
Figure 6: a worked example
Codes mean little on their own; they work together. projects are described by their complete group of codes — their ‘coding’ — which must include one (or more) primary codes from each of the six dimensions. A thoughtful coding should describe all the key features of the project, in this case that its objective is to improve (code e1.3) a model (c13.10.3, d9) of the changing risk (c13.10.4, E3.1.1.3) from extreme winds (d7.7, E3.3) to trees in forestry planta-tions (d5.2.8, D5.7, D2.1.4) which will help the industry (c2.2) to improve its practices (e5.b.5.2.1, e5.c.1) and so reduce production and economic losses (e5.a.3, E4.1.3, E4.5.1):
tree stability and climate (forestry commission)The programme will develop a forest wind risk model/decision support system that works within GIS. The original ForestGALES system was developed to provide risk assessments for uniform conifer stands and requires field measurements to give current risk, or yield models to provide an assessment of how risk changes over time. The GIS based model will use either sub-compartment or remote sensing data. It will be used to aid the design planning process, to provide risk assess-ments at a regional or country scale, and to provide assessments of wind risk from climate change and extreme event scenarios. Developing the model to work with uneven age and species stands will allow risk to be assessed for stands being managed or transformed to low impact silviculture.
frascatia4 Applied specific research
primary purposeb4 ppd technology support
human domainc2.2 forestryc13.10.3 modelling techniques & modelsc13.10.4 risk, probability & uncertainty assessment methods
environmental domainD2.1.4 cultivated land
d5.2.8 land & aquatic plantsD5.7 animals & plants exploited commercially for purposes other than food
d7.7 extreme windsd9 the non-natural world
epicse1.3 forecasting, hindcasting & developing scenariosE3.1.1.3 change in frequency & severity of extreme weather events
E3.3 short-term impacts
E4.1.3 shortage of timber & non-food crops
E4.5.1 economic consequences for countries, firms or individuals
e5.a.3 mitigation of & adaptation to effects on mane5.b.5.2.1 improvements in crop productione5.c.1 improvements in commerce, industry & private life
geographyg2.2.1 united kingdom
Primary codes are shown in bold type and secondary codes in normal type.
There is usually scope for judgement in the details of coding. In this case, for example, it could be argued that the C2.2 and G2.2.1 codes together make it sufficiently clear that the work is concerned with managed plantations, and the D2.1.4 and D5.7 codes are superfluous; they do, though, make the coding more explicit.
14
15
3 codIng projects
CODING PROjECTS
Projects are coded using bespoke software — the ‘coding form’ — which presents all available information about the project, shows the complete coding scheme dimension-by-dimension in a tree-view format, and echoes the coding as the coder builds it up. Codes are allocated by double-clicking on the code name (Ctrl-double-click for a secondary). Completed codings are saved in a file which is later loaded into the database by LWEC staff.
The details of the coding form interface (shown below in Figure 7) and the use of the software are explained in a separate manual, and an animated demonstration is available.
This chapter explains how to decide what codes to apply to a project.
It assumes that the coder is already familiar with the structure of the coding scheme and the meaning of all the dimensions (described in the previous chapter), and has at least a reasonable mental picture of what codes are available in each dimension.
Codes have descriptive names as far as possible, and where amplification is helpful a click on a name in the coding form brings up an explanation (a ‘hint’) underneath the code tree. Simply moving the cursor over a code name brings up the first line of its hint in the status bar at the bottom of the form window.
Familiarity with the scheme and codes is a pre-requisite for high-quality coding: plunging in without it is a sure road to poor results.
Figure 7: The codiNg Form
Project title
Environmental Domain code tree - allocated primary codes yellow, secondary codes green
Echo of allocated codes - the summary description
Hint explaining the code currently selected (outlined in orange)
Project description
Tabs to select dimensions
16
To recap the coding scheme’s main features:
It is designed to describe research on both the z
environment (the natural world) and on human interaction with it.
The main aim in coding is to summarise the z
work that is actually done in a project.
This is done using primary codes. Secondary z
codes can be used to provide additional information, including what the work is being done for when this is specific and clear.
The main description is built up from codes z
in four core dimension, Human Domain, Environmental Domain, EPICS — Earth, Pressures, Impacts, Consequences and Solutions — and Geography. Two other dimensions, Frascati and Primary Purpose, are included for compatibility with national and international statistics on research spending.
Human Domain (C) codes are used in coding z
work on human interaction with the environ-ment to describe who is doing the interacting.
Environmental Domain (D) codes describe z
what aspect of the natural world in being investigated (if any).
EPICS (E) codes show whether work focuses on: z
Earth, the natural world itself z
the Pressures man puts on on it z
Impacts these (and natural hazards) have on z
the environment
Consequences that Impacts and natural z
hazards have for man
Solutions that aim to reduce the Pressures z
or adverse Impacts or Consequences, or
some combination of these. z
Every project must have at least one primary z
code from each of the four core dimensions and Frascati (many have more in some), and (only) one Primary Purpose code.
Coders should aim to use the minimum z
number of codes necessary to summarise the key features of projects. Using more only leads to false positives in searches.
general approach
It is important to code as precisely as possible: every missing, superfluous or wrongly-used code makes the database a little less useful.
The first thing to do when starting to code a new project is to read its title, description, and any other information available about it, such as the funder. Then pause and think critically about it; don’t just seize on a word and start applying codes: the reality of projects is often not what it seems to be at first glance. If necessary, get more information from the web or elsewhere. The main — sometimes considerable — difficulty in coding is to decide precisely what work projects involve. When that is clear, choosing codes to describe them effectively calls for care but is rarely hard.
Coders should aim to understand each project thoroughly before starting to allocate codes: this saves time in the end, and it is a pre-requisite for consistently good quality codings.
The other pre-requisite is a check on each completed coding using the echo, comparing the overall picture it conveys, and its details, with the project title and description. A good coding will usually give a clear picture of the project (sometimes clearer than the original description), and thoughtful comparison will reveal most mistakes and often suggest improvements — even to an expert coder.
traps to watch out for
It can be surprisingly difficult to strip away discus-sion of purpose and focus on what work is actually being done in a project. Descriptions of projects funded by research councils are based on grant applications, and these are often as much or more concerned with demonstrating that work ‘is relevant to’ or ‘will contribute to understanding of’ a topical concern such as climate change as with describing the actual work to be done. Speculative uses of results like these are always irrelevant for coding (whatever the funder) — particularly when, as often, the link between the work and any practical value is long and tenuous. It can take care and patience to sort the wheat from the chaff.
CODING PROjECTS
17
Fortunately, the real work in academic projects typically has a narrow focus, and this allows them to be fully characterised with only a few codes — especially when they are concerned solely with the science of the natural world and only Environmental Domain, Earth and possibly Impact and Geography codes are significant1. Six primary codes in the core dimensions is typical. Coding projects like this is usually easy and takes a skilled coder only two or three minutes.
Descriptions of projects commissioned by govern-ment departments and agencies have different traps for the unwary. They are often a small part of a larger programme, and the description may be more about this than about the specific project: what looks superficially like research on pollution control policy may actually be just a survey of water quality in a particular river. Also, unlike typically narrow and deep academic projects, many are broad and shallow, with several aspects.
Most are concerned with human interactions with the environment — pressures, impacts, consequences or solutions, in Envirobase terms — and they may include elements of two or more of these, and require correspondingly numerous codes to characterise them adequately. However, some aspects may only be peripheral to the main work, and it can require careful thought to decide where the focus really lies, and code appropriately.
Even without this complication, coding work on these interactions inevitably calls for more codes than work on the natural world alone — especially work on solutions, which have three-faceted codes. Also, since many of these projects are commissioned to inform policy, a stage removed from physical interaction, the interactions are indirect, and that can require even more codes.
These characteristics tend to make departmental and agency-funded projects more difficult and time-consuming to code than academic projects. They
1 They do, of course, also require Frascati and Primary Purpose codes (usually ‘general support’, B1), a pass-through Human Domain code (C1), and a ‘non-geographic’ (G4) code if they are not associated with a specfic geographical area, but Frascati and Primary Purpose codes are almost standard in academic natural science projects and call for little thought.
may require as many as a dozen primary codes to summarise all their key aspects and another dozen secondaries to show its context, and the hardest cases can take much longer to code adequately.
Some projects, particularly from research council research centres, pose a different challenge again: they may have no description at all, and the title may be cryptic. A Web search may reveal enough information to allow them to be coded; if not, they should be referred to the Database Manager.
Research can be necessary in other situations, too: project descriptions often contain specialist terms which need to be understood in order to code correctly, and it is unwise to guess what they mean.
make sure you understand what codes mean
Code names have been chosen to make their meaning as explicit as possible, but it is not always possible to avoid all ambiguity without making them unreasonably long.
The classification scheme is hierarchical, so codes always share their parents’ meaning. In EPICS, for example, E2.2.B.4 ‘usage’ is a child of E2.2.B ‘by source of pollution’, and refers specifically to the use of equipment and materials as a source of pollution and not as a cause of resource depletion.
Many codes also have explanatory hints. These should always be checked before codes are allocated to make sure they are being used correctly.
code (only) at the most detailed level possible
Classes are relatively broad at the top level of the hierarchy, and become increasingly specific in successively lower levels. In the Human Domain, for example:
C6 Utilities & related public services C6.1 water supply & river basin management C6.2 waste management C6.2.1 sewage & other water-borne biodegradable waste C6.2.2 biodegradable solid waste C6.2.3 non-biodegradable solid waste C6.2.4 hazardous & other special waste C6.3 electricity & natural gas distribution, & telecoms
18CODING PROjECTS
The most specific code that applies should always be used; more than one can be used if appropriate.
Codes from levels above the lowest in the hierarchy should be used only when:
there is insufficient information in the project z
description to identify a more specific codeOR
all the codes in the level below apply z
ORmore than three codes in the level below apply. z
There is often a specific ‘cross-sector’, ‘cross-domain’ or equivalent code to use in this case.
Projects must not be given codes which have a direct parent - descendant relationship; a project with a C6.2.1 code, for example, cannot also have a C6.2 or C6 code (but could have a C6.3 code). Every class below the top level is a detail of its parent class, so including codes from two levels would be contradictory.
facets
Faceted codes — E2.2, ‘polluting activities’, for example — cannot be allocated on their own (the coding form software prevents it): one or more codes must be allocated in each separate facet. In the case of polluting activities, this means that both the type (facet A) and source (facet B) of the pollution must be identified. If one or both are not known, the appropriate ‘non-specific’ code(s) (usually the last in the list) must be used.
If one facet is given a primary code all the other facets must have at least one primary code, too.
The ‘Validate Classification’ button on the coding form checks this (among other things) and lists any codes which violate the rule.
Dimension-specific issues
In addition to these general approach issues, there are others that arise in specific parts of the classification scheme.
The following six sections discuss these dimension-by-dimension. They should be read in conjunction with the earlier discussion of the six dimensions on pages 6 - 13.
frascati
As noted, the Frascati classification scheme — explained in detail in Annex A — is ill-suited to environmental research. Projects normally have only one Frascati code, but it can be difficult to judge which that should be. Its neighbours often look equally plausible, and they may or may not be equally acceptable. Funders are not always as discriminating as they should be in allocating Frascati codes, and theirs (which appear in the ‘Extra 1’ or ‘Extra 2’ pane in the coding form, where they exist), cannot be relied on. Fortunately, Frascati codes are significantly correlated with funder, and this can give a guide.
NERC, uniquely, has a high proportion of ‘pure basic’ projects (coded A1) in its portfolio — around 30%2. ESRC is the only other funder with more than a few ‘pure basic’ projects; most have none.
Government departments and agencies typically have no ‘pure basic’ or ‘oriented basic’ projects (A2), or only a few. Only DFID and the Environment Agency have more than trivial numbers, around 20% of their portfolios.
Research councils typically have more. About 30% of most councils’ environmental projects were oriented basic in 2004-5, and the proportion is tending to increase at the expense of pure basic work. EPSRC funds fewer, around 10%).
The commonest Frascati classification for most funders is ‘applied strategic’ (A3). These were the largest category by far for several government departments and agencies in 2004-5, and for BBSRC. They were roughly equal largest category alongside ‘applied specfic’ (A4) for Defra and DFID, and not far from equal for the Environment Agency and EPSRC.
‘Experimental development’ projects (A5) are relatively uncommon, accounting for 10% or less of all funders’ portfolios except EPSRC’s, which included around 15% in 2004-5.
Non-Frascati projects (A6) are almost absent from Envirobase.
2 This and other figures quoted here come from analysis of projects active in 2004-5, in an earlier version of the database.
19
primary purpose
Primary Purpose classifications, discussed in detail in Annex B, are more clearly distinguished than Frascati and correspondingly easier to allocate. Projects can have only one.
The commonest mistake in using them is to confuse research on ‘government services’ (coded B2 in Envirobase, ppB in government) with ‘policy support’ (B3 or ppC). The distinction appears not to be understood even by some staff in government departments, who have a tendency to regard all the research they sponsor as ‘policy support’, presum-ably because they customarily think of their work as policy-making; in fact not all of it is. Funders’ own Primary Purpose classifications (which appear in the ‘Extra 1’ or ‘Extra 2’ pane on the coding form where they exist) can therefore be misleading.
As Annex B explains, the distinction is straightfor-ward in principle:
‘government services’ are provided under z
the established interpretation of existing legislation, and research on them is typically to improve the technology used to do so or to help decide what to do in specific cases — whether to use hard defences against rising sea levels or let new saltmarsh form, for example. Most is funded by agencies such as the Met Office and the Environment Agency.
‘policy support’ is work done to help the z
development of new legislation or inform ministerial decisions which change the interpretation of existing legislation. Most is funded by central departments.
‘General support’ (coded ppA or B1) is defined as ‘funding provided to advance knowledge for its own sake’. Research council funding used to fit this definition with ease, but with an increasing proportion of it motivated by practical concerns such as climate change (albeit often several steps removed from any practical application) the line between ‘general support’ and ‘policy support’ is becoming blurred. In practice it is now largely based on funder: research council projects should be coded ‘general support’ unless there is a clear link between them and a policy department.
human domain
The 13 Human Domain (C) codes and their 84 sub-codes are used in describing research on human interaction with the environment, and on man-made entities such as technology and public policy, to identify who is doing the interacting or making, directly or indirectly — that is, which industry or what aspect of human society is causing environmental change (good or bad), being affected by the environment (including changes in it and natural hazards), or seeking to affect one or the other of these interactions in the future.
The discussion here should be read in conjunction with the earlier Human Domain section on pages 6 - 8.
natural science projects
Research that focuses solely on the state or behaviour of the natural world should be given only one primary C code, the ‘pass-through’ code ‘The natural world’ (C1).
Some research on the natural world is concerned with things that are, or might be, affected by human behaviour, or have consequences for human activity, but that is not in itself a reason for giving it other C codes: as noted before, codes should never be used to indicate mere relevance.
However, research on the natural world may justify one or more additional, secondary C codes to identify its context. Research on cod popula-tions, for example, would have secondary ‘fishing and aquaculture’ (C3) and ‘government policy & services’ (C13.93) secondary codes as well as a primary C1 code if it was commissioned as an input to government policy on commercial fishing.
Research which focuses on an interaction between the natural world and man rather than on natural science per se is described by primary C codes appropriate to the human side of the interaction. Work on the effect that the design of fishing nets has on cod populations, or on the effect that declining stocks have on the fishing industry, for
3 References in this chapter to codes with sub-codes should be read as references to the whole family group, unless the context suggests otherwise. In this case, therefore, C13.9 means ‘C13.9 or one of its sub-codes’.
20CODING PROjECTS
example, would have a C3 ‘fishing & aquaculture’ primary code.
Projects like this may produce original knowledge about the natural world as well as new knowledge about the interaction. When they do, they have both a C1 and other C primary codes. An Environment Agency project to investigate ways to improve its monitoring of water quality in a river that included the collection of new field data on the river’s current status, for example, would have both C1 and C13.9 primary codes.
This is an example of the general principle that when projects include two or more different kinds of work they have a judicious combination of the codes that would be used for those kinds of work in separate projects. If a particular code would be primary in one of these and secondary in the other it becomes primary in the combined project.
Interactions involving specific sectors
Codes C2 - C8 and their sub-codes identify industrial activities, C9 the use of buildings, C10 commerce & office-based services, C11 the public sector and C12 private households. Between them, these are responsible for all anthropogenic changes in the environment; many of them are also affected (or potentially affected) by environmental factors such as ground stability and plant physiology, environmental change, and hazards like flooding. The C2 - C12 family of codes are used to identify the human side of all direct, physical interactions with the environment, whatever kind they are.
Projects concerned with up to three specific sectors should be given a code for each, but if more are involved the C13.19 ‘multiple or unknown sectors, & other indirect’ code should be used instead of individual sector codes. This code is also used for work on materials (such as nanoparticles) or activities (such as carbon emissions in general) that are or may be connected with numerous sectors.
Transport and buildings are special cases because they are used by all the other sectors. The coding of research in these areas is explained under Sector overlaps on page 7.
The use of individual codes in the C2 - C12 families — and of all the other codes in the classification scheme — is described in hints in the coding form when it is not clear from the name of the code.
cross-sector and indirect interactions
Cross-sector and indirect interactions on the same page explains in outline how the classifica-tion scheme characterises the human side of interactions that are not associated with individual industries or households — carbon emissions in general, population growth, and human health, for example — and research on indirect influences on the environment such as government policy, human psychology and scientific instruments for use in future work on the environment. These all have codes in the C13 family.
Indirect interactions should normally be given both an appropriate C13 primary code and a secondary code to show which sector’s interac-tions with the environment they are intended to influence, where this is clear from the project description. Research on planning policy in floodplains, for example, would have a C8 ‘construction’ secondary code as well as a C13.9 ‘government policy & services’ primary code.
It is not always obvious whether to use a specific sector code or a cross-sector code: work on some aspects of rural affairs, for example, might be coded C13.5 ‘rural affairs’, C12 ‘private house-holds’ or (in other cases) given an industrial sector code such as C2.3 ‘land management’. Rules that help in cases like this are that:
codes should identify the sector that z makes the key decisions about the interaction (with the environment) which is being investigated
the most specific code(s) that apply should z
always be used.
Research on the environmental impact of second homes in the country, for example, would have a C13.9 primary code if it was concerned specifi-cally with planning policy, a C12 ‘private house-holds’ primary code if it focused on an aspect of the owners’ behaviour, such as their use of transport, and in both cases a C13.5 ‘rural affairs’
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secondary code to show that the planning policy or travel in question was in the country.
The scope of most of the codes in the C13 family is self-evident from their names (sometimes amplified by hints), but the use of some is less obvious.
C13.9 ‘government policy & services’ is used as a primary code only for work on the evaluation and improvement of the terms and implementation of current policies and services, and on the devel-opment of new ones — that is, when the results have implications for government action. Most but not all work like this is funded by government departments and agencies.
C13.9 is used as a secondary code to show the context of:
projects which simply provide information for z
use in subsequent policy or service develop-ment work, and say nothing themselves about government activities; these have C1 ‘natural world’, C2 - 13.8 or C13.19 sector primary codes to show what the information is about.
work which is part of the delivery of a public z
service, such as the production of an informa-tion leaflet based on the results of previous research; this has C2 - 12 or C13.19 primary codes identifying the service’s audiences.
Research on tools and processes which will be used predominantly by the private sector, such as work on animal husbandry to help farms avoid environmentally-borne infections, is essentially a public service, and treated in the same way.
C13.10 ‘scientific equipment & methods’ and its 8 sub-codes are used to describe work whose main objective is to develop environmental sensors, instruments and other scientific equipment and techniques (including mathematical techniques etc) for use in later research, public services (such as pollution monitoring, flood warning etc), industry or commerce. They are used as primary codes when the results are likely to be used predominantly in academic research and as secondary codes — accompanying a C13.9 or
one or more appropriate C2 -12 primary codes — when they are likely to be used predominantly in a public service, industry or commerce.
C13.10 secondary codes are also used to make E5.C ‘solutions|implementation route’ codes more specific: work to assess the risk of flooding, for example, would have a C13.10.4 ‘risk, probability & uncertainty assessment methods’ secondary code to accompany its E5.C.2 ‘..|implementation route|improvements in public services’ primary code.
When scientific equipment or methods are developed in the course of a project for immediate use rather than (or only incidentally) for use in later work — that is, when they do not form a signifi-cant part of the project output — this aspect of the work is ignored for coding; codes should describe only a project’s main aims and outputs. A C13.10 secondary code may, though, be appropriate if the development is a substantial part of the work even though it is not its main objective, particularly if the equipment etc is likely to be used by other researchers in later projects.
C13.11 ‘enabling & exploitation of research’ and its 6 sub-codes are used mainly for projects whose main objective is to make work in later projects possible or help it to be carried out, or to help exploit previous work, rather than to produce original knowledge themselves. Like C13.10 codes, they are used as primaries when the work they enable is academic research and as second-aries when they enable work by the government departments or agencies, or by the private sector; in the latter case they are accompanied by C13.9 or C2 - 12 primary codes.
The first code in the family, C13.11.1 ‘enabling & exploitation of research|infrastructure, equipment & overheads’, is used as a primary code for the purchase of equipment from outside suppliers (as opposed to funding for its development, which would have a C13.10 code). Funding like this may, though, also have a C13.10 secondary code to explain in more detail what it is for, if an appropriate one exists.
Other C13.11 codes are used as primaries to describe enabling activities such as the management
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and co-ordination of research, and exploitation activities such as disseminating results. They are also used as secondaries to qualify E5.C codes: work to help gas producers set up a central database of weather data from their rigs in the North Sea, for example, would have a C13.11.2 ‘..|assembling & hosting datasets & collections of physical specimens’ secondary to qualify its primary E5.C.1 ‘..|implementation route|improvements in commerce, industry & private life’ code.
environmental domain (d)
Environmental Domain codes are used to show what part of the natural world is involved in research, either as its prime focus or as one side of an interaction between man and the environment.
They classify aspects of the natural world in a rather different way from the traditional academic disciplines such as biology, geology, oceanography and so on in order to reflect better the concerns and interdisciplinary character of modern envi-ronmental research, and so make projects easier to code and the database easier to use, particularly for non-academics in government and elsewhere.
The discussion here should be read together with the earlier Environmental Domain section on page 8.
research on the non-natural world
Projects that produce no new knowledge about the natural world — work on energy technologies, industrial processes, scientific instruments and public policy, for example — have a ‘pass-through’ primary code, ‘The non-natural world’ (D9). If the work enables future research on a specific aspect of the natural world this is identi-fied by other primary D codes.
earth system (d1)
Earth System codes identify work on the major natural systems which govern the evolution of the planet and create the climate.
At the moment there are only 7 codes and sub-codes, which distinguish between systems involved in the climate and weather (D1.1 and its four sub-codes) on a timescale of centuries or less,
and longer-term systems such as plate tectonics (D1.9). More sub-codes may be added in future if the balance of research changes.
These codes should be used only for work on the whole system or important sub-systems which are being studied in the system context; they are not used for work on these sub-systems in other contexts.
Projects concerned with specific parts of these systems, such as atmospheric chemisty, have primary codes to identify them in addition to a D1 family primary code.
D1.1 may also be used as a secondary code for projects concerned with the effects of climate and weather, together with one or more primary codes that identify the part of the land, sea, or biosphere where the effects arise.
lithosphere (d2)
The meaning of most ‘lithosphere’ codes is self-evident, but the ‘land & landscape’ (D2.1) & ‘soils & sediments’ (D2.2) families have some subtleties.
D2.1 ‘land & landscape’ family codes are used to characterise research related to specific types of land cover, including work on surface features of the land and the visual qualities of landscape. They are used both as primary codes for work on land & landscape per se and (perhaps more often) as secondary codes to place animals, plants, rivers, and processes such as erosion and flooding in specific land environments. Geography (G) codes may be used to provide other locational informa-tion in terms of continent, country or climatic zone.
D2.2 ‘soils & sediments’ has two sub-codes. D2.2.1 ‘soils & other natural loose materials on the land surface’ is used to identify loose material found on the surface of dry land. It includes the biological components of soil and immobile water, but excludes mobile groundwater which has its own ‘hydrosphere’ code (D3.1.2). Similar loose surface materials underwater, or frequently submerged at the margins of water bodies, are coded as part of the hydrosphere, for example as ‘seabed’ (D3.2.4) — in this case up to the extreme high tide mark.
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The ‘sediments’ code, D2.2.2, is used for particu-late material found between surface material and underlying rock either on land or underwater. Research on the commercial extraction of sediments such as sand or gravel should have both a D2.2.2 and an ‘other minerals of economic value|minerals used in construction’ (D2.4.1) primary code; work on these materials out of their environmental context has only a D2.4.1 code.
Solid rock on or under land is coded ‘other land surface, continental crust, & geodesy’ (D2.6) whether it is on or below the surface. The oceanic crust and the deeper geology of the Earth has a separate code, D2.7.
There are specific codes for the various fossil fuels (D2.3 family), and for ‘other minerals of economic value’ such as those used in building, and metal ores (D2.4 family). ‘Earth history evidence’ (D2.5) is used for research on the planet’s history that involves fossils and geological features such as meteorite impact craters and the iridium layer.
There are inevitably some overlaps between these highly specific lithosphere codes and more general ones, for example between coal (D2.3.1) and rock (D2.6). These are resolved by the general rule always to use the most specific code possible.
hydrosphere (d3)
Complications arise in the use of the ‘hydrosphere’ codes only at the junctions between water and land or air, and between different parts of bodies of water — between ‘inshore & coastal water’, ‘other continental shelf & shallow seas’ and ‘deep oceans’, for example. In other respects, the use of hydrosphere codes is self-evident.
Like lithosphere codes, hydrosphere codes are used both as primaries and as secondaries making biosphere (D4) codes more specific by showing where animals or plants live — distinguishing, for example, between sea and freshwater
The treatment of the junctions between water and land or air is fully explained in Water/ground, ground/water and water/air interfaces on page 8. Put briefly, the beds and margins of rivers, the sea and so on have specific hydrosphere family codes
(D3.1.6, D3.2.4 and D3.3.3) which refer to both the water and the underlying surface.
As noted, groundwater has its own code (D3.1.2), and there is a specific code for research on the ‘complete drainage basin’ (D3.1.1), which encompasses the land topography, surface soil and groundwater as well as the watercourses into which they drain.
Freshwater, brackish water and salt water each have their own families of codes (D3.1, D3.2 and D3.3 respectively). The junctions are the obvious ones, and are not defined precisely.
The junctions between the parts of the sea do have specific definitions: up to 3 miles from the coast is classified as ‘inshore & coastal water’ (D3.2.1); ‘other continental shelf & shallow seas’ (D3.2.2) — typically less than 150m in depth and varying in width, up to 1500km in the case of the Siberian Shelf — extend to the edges of the shelves; and the rest is coded ‘deep oceans’ (D3.2.3).
atmosphere (d4)
The 9 sub-codes of atmosphere identify processes rather than physical locations, reflecting the subdivision of research in the field. Their use is largely self-evident, and hints are provided to define it explicitly.
Atmosphere family codes are often used in combi-nation: D4.1 ‘atmosphere dynamics & transport (winds etc)’ may, for example, be accompanied by D4.5 ‘local & regional processes in the atmosphere’ for work on airflow over complex land features (in this case perhaps with a land & landscape family code as well), local pollutant dispersion, or airflow in local weather forecasting.
Hazardous events such as hurricanes, tornadoes and other extreme winds and rain have their own ‘natural hazards’ (D7) family codes, and these should normally be used for research on them rather than the more general D4.5 code.
D4.2 ‘atmosphere composition & chemistry’ is not used for work on water in the atmosphere, which has a more specific code of its own (D4.3 ‘water in the atmosphere (clouds, precipitation etc)’.
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biosphere (d5)
Codes in the biosphere family fall into five groups:
D5.1 z ‘biological processes & systems which are not species-specific’ is used for work which is on processes common to, or which otherwise involves, several of the groups with individual (D5.2 family) codes.
D5.2 z is a family of 11 codes used for work on individual families, genera, species and so on of plants and animals, at all levels from the cellular to the dynamics of whole populations. These are often accompanied by qualifying secondary codes in the range D5.3 to D5.7. Most of these codes have hints which list all the commoner members of the group, and any with which coders are likely to be unfamiliar.
Man (D5.2.1) is a special case in that research on the biology, health and so on of humans is not regarded as ‘environmental’, and so is excluded from the database. D5.2.1 is used only for research on the way that aspects of man’s biology affect, or are affected by, the environment, individually or as part of society. It is most commonly used for work on human psychology (alongside a C13.8 ‘human psychology, attitudes, knowledge, lifestyle, culture & behaviour’ code) and environmental effects on health and safety (together with C13.7 ‘human safety & health’ and other appropriate codes such as natural hazards (D7 family).
Plankton are another exception: they include both animals and plants, and they are important enough in research to have their own code ‘cross-family groups|plankton’ (D5.9.1).
D5.3 - D5.7 z , respectively ‘cellular & genetic level’, ‘habitats’, ‘ecosystems (biomes), ecology & biodiversity’, ‘animals & plants used as food’ and ‘animals & plants exploited commercially for used other than food’, are most often used as secondaries to qualify codes in the D5.2 family. They can, though, also be used as primaries. Habitats (D5.4) and ecosys-tems (D5.5) in particular are often used in this way, usually in company with lithosphere (D2 family) or hydrosphere (D3 family) primaries.
The habitats code (D5.4) is used specifically for research on the properties of environments in which plants and animals live, including habitat quality metrics (except biodiversity, which is really a property of an ecosystem rather than a habitat). It is often accompanied by a D5.2 family code to identify the particular type of animal or plant concerned as well as by a lithosphere (D2) or hydrosphere (D3) family code.
The ecosystems, ecology & biodiversity code (D5.5) is used mainly for research on the systemic interactions of co-existing animals & plants with each other and their environment where there is no focus on a specific species; research which does focus on a specific species should have a D5.2 family primary code. D5.5 also covers work on biodiversity and its role in ecosystems (including biodiversity metrics), and on the biogeochemical systems in soil.
Like the habitats code, D5.5 is often accom-panied by a lithosphere or hydrosphere code to identify the land or water environment in which the ecosystem occurs.
It must not be used just because an issue being studied may affect an ecosystem.
D5.8 z ‘ecosystem services’ codes for a growing range of work on aspects of the natural world that are essential to human life. These include both physical services such as carbon absorption, pollination and water supply and psychological services such as the value of green spaces and countryside for leisure, health & wellbeing.
D5.9 z ‘cross-family groups’ has only two sub-codes at the moment, for plankton (D5.9.1) and for all other such groups (D5.9.9).
space (d6)
The D6 code covers research on the Earth as a planetary object and on all extra-terrestrial bodies and phenomena outside the atmosphere including the sun, solar wind, moon, planets, asteroids, cosmic radiation and so on.
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It is also used for work on the flux of solar radiation on the Earth and, together with other codes, for the effect this, magnetic storms, cosmic radiation and other things of extra-terrestrial origin have on the Earth, and the risks they create for us.
natural hazards (d7)
Natural hazards such as volcanoes and severe storms have their own family of codes because they would be difficult to code effectively in other ways.
The D7 family includes separate codes for all the main hazards — a total of 10, plus an ‘other’ code. They are used for research on the underlying physical processes, the extreme events them-selves, and — together with EPICS Impacts and Consequences codes — their short-term impacts on the environment and consequences for man.
Work on their long-term legacy, such as changes in topography caused by earthquakes and climate change triggered by asteroid impact, is excluded; research on topics like these can be characterised better by other Environmental Domain codes.
The use of most of the individual D7 family codes is self-evident, but:
D7.4 z ‘extreme offshore waves’ refers to very steep, high waves which are caused by interactions between conflicting currents and the wind, and can sink ships at sea and damage offshore structures such as oil platforms. These are quite different from tsunamis, which are caused by undersea earth movements and only become serious hazards when they reach land.
D7.5 ‘landslides, mud slides, avalanches z
and subsidence’ excludes flows of volcanic material, which are coded D7.1 ‘volcanoes’.
D7.6 ‘severe or prolonged heavy precipita- z
tion and storm surges’ and D7.7 ‘extreme winds’ are respectively the wet and windy aspects of severe storm systems. They are often, but not always, used together.
D7.8 z ‘flooding’ refers solely to flooding as a physical process — essentially, the flow of water over land. Where appropriate, it is used together with other D7 codes (to identify
causes) and EPICS Impacts and Consequences codes (to identify its effects).
D7.10 z ‘other natural hazards’ includes hazards such as magnetic storms, natural radio-activity, and widespread low-level hazards such as pathogens and poisonous plants.
cross-domain (d8)
This code is used for projects which involve work on four or more environmental domains.
epics
Most environmental research is driven either by curiosity or by concern that modern life is damaging planet Earth, and we need to find ways to stop it doing so.
Curiosity-driven research simply aims to add to our knowledge of the state of the natural world and how it works, by observing it and building descriptive and mathematical models of it.
Research motivated by practical concerns focuses on four distinguishable aspects of the problems it addresses, aiming to understand:
the z pressures we exert on the natural world by polluting it, using up irreplacable resources, and interfering in it with activities like damming rivers and changing genes
the changes these cause in the environment, z
such as rising temperatures and sea levels, declining fish stocks, and extinctions — their impacts
the z consequences that the impacts have for us, such as widespread flooding, shortages of vital metals, food and water, and social instability
what z solutions there are to these problems.
The codes in the EPICS dimension — the Earth (E1), Pressures (E2), Impacts (E3), Consequences (E4) and Solutions (E5) families — show which of these projects are concerned with, and identify their focus in more detail.
There are some variations on this simple picture, notably that some impacts and consequences
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have natural rather than anthropogenic causes — earthquakes, for example — and that we are seeking new ways to improve the environment and exploit the natural world to our advantage (without damaging it) as well as solutions to the environ-mental problems we have caused. These are also accommodated in the EPICS classifications.
Choosing EPICS codes for basic science research is nearly always straightforward: it requires only Earth (E1) and sometimes Impacts (E3) family codes, and there is rarely serious uncertainty about which are appropriate.
Choosing the right EPICS codes for other research can be considerably more difficult. Information in project descriptions about the actual work is often buried in an explanation of its context: much of the description of research on the risk to property from flooding (a consequence) may be about the effect of climate change on weather patterns, the behaviour of saturated soils, and the intended use of the results (impacts and a solution). It can be surpris-ingly hard to identify the actual work among all the noise, and so choose appropriate primary codes.
Most projects include actual work on only one link in the pressures - impacts - consequences - solutions chain, and require primary codes in only one branch of EPICS. Those that include work on two or more require primaries in more than one branch. Some projects also include original research on the natural world (typically data collec-tion in the field), and require an Earth code too.
It is often helpful to summarise the context of work (particularly on solutions) by adding one or more secondary codes to identify causes, effects and likely follow-up, if any: the pressure causing the impact that is being studied, the impact causing a consequence, the impact (effect) of a pressure, or the solution to a consequence, for example.
As a result, it is common for projects to have more codes from EPICS than from any other dimension, and this makes it particularly important to focus scrupulously on the core reality of projects and avoid over-coding. Unnecessary and incorrect codes reduce the value of the database by clut-tering up search hit-lists with false positives, and the more there are the more harm they do.
earth (e1)
Environmental Domain (D) codes identify the focus of research on the science and state of the natural world, but they give no information about what kind of research it is, and hence what kind of knowledge it produces. The Earth (E1) codes provide that, distinguishing between projects in which the main, or at least a major, objective is:
E1.1 z : developing better theoretical under-standing of natural entities, processes and systems
E1.2 z : collecting data in the field (sub-codes distinguish between short-term exercises and long-term monitoring)
E1.3 z : forecasting (predicting the future — tomorrow’s weather, for example), building scenarios (modelling speculative futures), improving models by comparing them with historic data (hindcasting) and in other ways, and developing new models.
The parent E1 code is used for projects which involve all three. Work with entirely different objectives — to inform policy or develop better farming practices, for example — sometimes inci-dentally involves collecting field data, forecasting, or other original research on the science or state of the natural world, or on modelling it. These projects should be given E1 codes only if this is a significant part of the work, and the results of it seem likely to be published or available for others to use. This is common (though not universal) in academic research, but less so in work funded by government departments or agencies. If publica-tion seems unlikely projects should be given primary codes which reflect their main outcomes (E5 codes for a ‘solution’, for example) and no, or only secondary, E1 codes.
pressures (e2)
The Pressures family of codes describes specific, physical human activities that have unintended, direct effects on the environment which are actually or potentially largely harmful. Human Domain (C) codes show who is responsible for these activities; Pressures codes show what they are.
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E2 codes say nothing about the effects the pressures have on the environment: these are iden-tified by another family of codes, E3 ‘Impacts’.
The E2 codes distinguish three basic types of pressure:
E2.1, ‘depletion of limited natural resources’ z
E2.2, ‘polluting activities’, and z
E2.3, ‘intervention in natural processes’. z
E2.1 has 9 sub-codes, including a catch-all ‘other’ code for resources which do not have a separate code of their own. Their use is largely self-evident. The only notable subtlety is that ‘destruction of countryside’ (E2.1.8) includes the loss of habitats, plants, animals and the ecosystem services that countryside provides as well as aesthetic and amenity losses.
E2.2 ‘polluting activities’ is faceted to allow both the type (facet A) and source (facet B) of pollution to be identified. Projects which have a primary code in one facet must also have one in the other, if only an ‘other’ or ‘non-specific’ code when no specific information is available.
The 18 sub-codes of the the ‘type’ facet (E2.2.A.1 - E2.2.A.22 — the range includes gaps to allow additional type-specific codes to be added) are largely self-explanatory, and some have hints listing common examples. They range from carbon dioxide (E2.2.A.1) and methane (E2.2.A.2) through heavy metals (E2.2.A.7) and particulates (E2.2.A.9) to odour (E2.2.A.14) and sepatate codes for non-specific pollution in the air, water and ground (E2.2.A.20, 21 and 22 respectively).
The ‘source’ facet has only 5 sub-codes (E2.2.B.1 - E2.2.B.9), including the ‘non-specific’ code, but these are more abstract and call for more careful use; they all have explanatory hints to help. The four specific sources are:
E2.2.B.1 z ‘leakage of hazardous substances during their extraction, manufacture, transport or processing’. This refers to the loss of the (wanted) substances as they are being extracted, transported and so on, for example in oil spills.
E2.2.B.2 z ‘waste by-products of industrial (including agricultural) processes’ are unwanted substances which are produced by these processes and today are often, though not always, captured for safe disposal.
E2.2.B.3 z ‘waste materials (end of life)’ are substances and objects that were originally produced for human use, but are no longer wanted and need to be disposed of. They include ordinary household and commercial solid waste, sewage (former food), more hazardous materials such as asbestos from old buildings (and other construction and demolition waste), scrapped cars and spent nuclear fuel. This code is also used for pollution arising in the course of disposing of these things, such as leachate from landfill. Note that sewage is included here but farm slurry (animal ‘sewage’) is regarded as a ‘waste by-product’ (E2.2.B.2).
E2.2.B.4 z ‘usage’ refers to diffuse pollutants unavoidably released in the course of normal industrial and domestic activities such as driving vehicles, heating buildings, generating electricity, spraying pesticides on crops and using mercury amalgam for dental fillings. Most anthropogenic carbon emissions come into this category.
E2.3 ‘intervention in natural processes’ is a small family of 5 codes, including an ‘other’ code. The four specific interventions are:
E2.3.1 z : interference in the carbon cycle, for example by felling forests. This code is specifi-cally for interference which is harmful, albeit unintentional; deliberate intervention in the carbon cycle which is intended to be beneficial, for example by re-forestration, is coded as a solution (E5.B.1.2, ‘maintenance & improve-ment of carbon sinks etc, and geoengineering’).
E2.3.2 z , intervention in land drainage and river flow, including abstracting water
E2.3.3 z , genetic modification, and
E2.3.4 z , introduction of alien species.
With explicit titles and hints, the use of these codes should be straightforward.
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impacts (e3)
Impacts are changes in the environment produced by anthropogenic pressures, or — in some cases — by natural events and processes, such as volcanic eruptions and the release of methane from melting permafrost. The E3 codes are generally straightforward to use.
The E3 family of codes distinguishes two basic kinds of impact:
E3.1 z ‘impacts on climate, land, water & air’, with a total of 30 sub-codes in two levels, and
E3.2 z ‘impacts on flora & fauna’, with 8 sub-codes in one level
and has one more code (with no sub-codes) to identify transient impacts, such as the effects of flooding:
E3.3 z ‘short-term impacts’.
E3.3 is used only as a secondary code to qualify E3.1 and E3.2 codes.
E3.1 ‘impacts on climate, land, water & air’ is divided into 5 groups of sub-codes, for
‘changes in the climate and weather’ (E3.1.1) z
‘other changes in the atmosphere’ (E3.1.2) z
‘changes in the seas and oceans’ (E3.1.3) z
‘changes in bodies of fresh and brackish water’ z
(E3.1.4), and
changes in the land (E3.1.5). z
These have up to 7 sub-codes each. Their names are largely self-explanatory, and hints are provided to clarify their precise scope.
The use of codes in the E3.2 ‘impacts on flora & fauna’ group is also generally obvious from their names, and amplified where necessary in hints.
consequences (e4)
Some changes in the environment have adverse consequences for man. Research on these is identified by the E4 family of codes; like the E3 codes, their use is largely self-evident,
Five groups of sub-codes distinguish:
E4.1 z ‘consequences for non-food material resources’, divided further into sub-codes for fossil fuels and their derivatives (E4.1.1), metals (E4.1.2), timber and non-food crops such as cotton (E4.1.3), and fertile land (E4.1.4); a fifth code covers other consequences of this kind.
E4.2 z ‘consequences for food & water supplies’, which has separate sub-codes for fish stocks (E4.2.1), the production of other animal-based foods such as meat and dairy products (E4.2.2), the production of food and forage crops (E4.2.3), and drinking and sanitary water (E4.2.4). Two further codes cover other consequences for food supplies (E4.2.5) — such as the potential effect of biodiversity loss on the scope for breeding better food plants — and for water supplies, for example for irrigation. (E4.2.6).
The difference between E4.2.2/E4.2.3 and E4.2.5 is that the former two refer to direct consequences for production capacity, and the latter to indirect consequences.
E4.3 z ‘consequences for the built environment & human life’. These are are grouped together because they are threatened by the same processes and events — flooding, extreme winds, earthquakes and so on — and research can be relevant to both. The 5 specific sub-codes covering flooding, permanent inundation by the sea, extreme winds, earthquakes and tsunamis respectively (E4.3.1 - E4.3.5) and two for ‘other’ consequences are all self-explanatory.
E4.4 z ‘consequences for human health’, with 5 specific sub-codes and an ‘other’, again all self-explanatory
E4.5 z ‘consequences for wealth & quality of life’, with three specific sub-codes and an ‘other code’.
A final sub-code E4.6 ‘projects concerned with multiple consequences’ is divided into sub-codes for consequences of climate change, and others.
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solutions (e5)
Solutions are means that man is investigating — or already using — to help reduce future damage to the environment, use natural resources better (sometimes the same thing), repair past damage to and/or improve the environment, and reduce or adapt to adverse consequences for man. There are codes both for activities which have a direct, physical effect (such as making buildings more energy-efficient, better waste management, and nature conservation schemes), and for those whose effect is indirect, such as changes in regulations and taxes, and information services.
Work simply concerned with enabling future environmental research has a separate code, E7.
E5 primary codes are intended only for research which is specifically aimed at developing or improving a solution, and has a clear implementa-tion route. When research has other motivations (such as curiosity) and any value its results may have in developing a solution in future is just speculative it must not be given an E5 code.
E5 is the largest family of codes in EPICS, and using it correctly demands more of coders than almost any other part of the classification scheme.
It has three facets, allowing the purpose of the solution (facet A), its technical nature (facet B) and its implementation route (C) all to be characterised.
The ‘purpose’ facet has only three sub-codes:
E5.A.1 z ‘prevention or reduction of future damage to the environment, & better use of natural resources’
E5.A.2 z ‘mitigation/remediation of past damage to the environment & environmental improve-ment’, and
E5.A.3 z ‘mitigation of & adaptation to effects on man’.
These are reasonably self-explanatory, and explained further by hints.
The ‘technical nature’ facet has nearly 80 sub-codes in up to 3 lower levels. However, this fine subdivision allows most of the codes to be very specific, and so easy to understand and use.
The 9 code groups in the second level (the next below E5) describe solutions ‘mainly benefiting’:
E5.B.1 z ‘.. climate change and/or supplies of energy & oil-based materials’. These are treated as one because most of the solutions are common to both: reducing the use of fossil fuels both cuts carbon emissions and leaves more to be used in future for energy or as a feedstock for materials such as plastics.
The main exceptions are ‘carbon capture and storage’ (E5.B.1.1), ‘maintenance & improve-ment of carbon sinks, and geoengineering’ (E5.B.1.2), ‘minimisation of methane release from biodegradable wastes’ (E5.B.1.13) and ‘minimisation of methane production from livestock’ (E5.B.1.14), which all benefit the climate but not fossil fuel supplies, and ‘improved extraction & use of depleted, lower-grade and novel oil, gas and uranium resources’ (E5.B.1.9), which only benefits energy supplies.
E5.B.1 is the largest code group, with 25 sub-codes in two levels.
E5.B.2 z ‘.. supplies of other finite material resources’. This group includes techniques such as reducing the amount of material in manufactured goods, more sustainable use of wild plants and animals (tropical hardwoods, for example), and recycling. There is a total of 8 sub-codes in two levels, plus an ‘other’ code.
E5.B.3 z ‘.. land, water & air quality’, divided into 5 codes for solutions such as changes in land use, reduction of pollution at source, waste reduction, and the remediation of land and rivers. There are two further sub-codes for ‘other’solutions in land, soil and water, and air, quality respectively.
E5.B.4 z ‘.. flora & fauna’. This is a group of only 3 sub-codes, for habitats and ecosystems, individual species, and ‘other’ solutions.
E5.B.5 z ‘.. supplies of food, water & material resources derived from plants & animals’. This has 18 sub-codes in 2 levels covering tech-niques ranging from genetic modification and
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improved farming methods to more selective use of antibiotics, water demand management and desalination.
At first sight the techniques in this group may appear to overlap those in the ‘supplies of other finite material resources’ (E5.B.2) group, but in fact they do not. The flora and fauna in that group are exploited as materials and not for food (and are all wild, hence being a finite resource), whereas most of those in the ‘supplies of food, water & material resources ...’ (E5.B.5) group are either cultivated or at least from managed sources (and so renewable resources) and the few that are wild are used as food.
E5.B.6 z ‘... the built environment or human life’. The five sub-codes in this group cover respectively ‘risk assessment, forecasting, warning, protection & relief’ (E5.B.6.1), ‘coastal defences & managed abandonment’ (E5.B.6.2), ‘land drainage & river basin management’ (E5.B.6.3), ‘planning & design of the built environment’ (E5.B.6.4) and ‘other’ solutions (E5.B.6.9).
E5.B.7 z ‘human health’, a code on its own
E5.B.8 z ‘... wealth & quality of life’. This is a group of four codes covering approaches such as landscape preservation, the creation of new cycleways and parks, economic diversification, and ‘other’.
E5.B.9 z , the final code, is for ‘solutions with several areas of benefit and/or involving several technical components’.
The 70-plus bottom-level E5.B.x.x codes are organised in these 9 groups purely in order to make them easier for database users and coders to use. As the phrase ‘mainly benefiting’ implies many of the actions they describe also have other benefits, and the gouping is not intended to be a constraint on their use. E5.B.6.1 ‘risk assessment, forecasting, warning, protection & relief’, for example, is most often used in a flooding context (hence appearing in the ‘.. built environment or human life’ group), but it can also be useful in health and other contexts, accompanied by other codes to make the context clear.
The ‘implementation route’ facet has only 5 immediate sub-codes (including one for ‘other’), and only one of those has sub-codes of its own.
The five main codes are:
E5.C.1 z ‘improvements in commerce, industry & private life’
E5.C.2 z ‘improvements in public services’
E5.C.3 z ‘improvements in policy, legal and economic instruments’, with 7 sub-codes including an ‘other’
E5.C.4 z ‘information services, education, training & public engagement’, and
E5.C.9 z ‘mixed or unknown implementation route’.
All solutions involve somebody changing what they do in a way that has a direct physical effect on the environment (emitting less carbon, releasing less pollution and so on), or at least doing something (such as changing regulations or taxes, or providing information) that will influence others to change their physical interaction with the environment — a solution at one remove.
The first two codes in this facet, E5.C.1 and E5.C.2, identify whose activities or behaviour need to change. It only distinguishes coarsely between the private and public sectors because ‘commerce, industry & private life’ is already finely divided in the Human Domain dimension, into around 50 industries and groups.
‘Public services’ are defined in the same way as ‘government services’ in the Primary Purpose dimension: E5.C.2 codes for improvements in the scientific basis and operation of services such as environmental monitoring, pollution control, flood warning systems and so on within the current interpretation of existing legislation.
The next two codes, E5.C.3 and E5.C.4, are relevant only to solutions at one remove, and show what mechanism they use to influence behaviour. It is self-evident in most cases that government will be responsible for developing and exerting the influence; this is only implicit here, but again it is explicitly identified by Human Dimension codes.
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E5.C.4 ‘information services ...’ is used solely for information aimed directly at influencing people in commerce, industry, private life and the public sector to change their physical behaviour. Publications in the research literature and reports solely for internal use within government and its agencies are coded E7, ‘Projects concerned with enabling future environmental research’.
the ‘mixed’ code (e6)
Some projects are concerned with a mixture of too many pressures, impacts, consequences and/or solutions for it to be either practicable (for coders) or helpful (for database users) to identify them with individual codes. These are identified simply by E6 as ‘Projects explicitly or implicitly concerned with several Pressures, Impacts, Consequences and/or Solutions’.
enabling future environmental research (e7)
Some projects produce no original knowledge about the earth, pressures, impacts, consequences or solutions but simply enable future academic research that will, or will help to, exploit the results from previous research. These are simply coded E7; the detail of what they involve — developing a sensor, hosting a data collection, networking or publishing results, for example — is described by C13.10 or C13.11 codes.
Otherwise similar work that enables practical action by industry or government is part of a ‘solution’ and has E5 codes.
geography (g)
Much, though not all, environmental research is associated with a specific geographic location or climatic zone. This may be, for example, because it involves collecting field data; regulations which only apply in one country; services available only in one country; or vegetation which has charac-teristics specific to a climatic zone. The main aim of the Geography dimension is to identify the location(s) concerned in projects like this.
Other codes identify research concerned with the global scale or space (G1), and research which has
no geographic associations (G6) — most basic science, and work on industrial processes, for example.
It can be difficult to decide whether a project has a sufficiently clear geographic association to justify giving it anything other than the ‘non-geographic’ code G6. This may require careful thought.
The main series of geographic codes subdivide the Earth quite coarsely into continents, major regions, oceans, the major seas, and broad climatic zones. Finer distinctions are made in Europe, with the finest of all in the United Kingdom and surrounding sea areas, but even here England (for example) has only a single code.
The regions defined by individual codes are well-defined, and using them is generally straight-forward. The codes are:
G2 z ‘Continents & regions’, which covers most of the Earth in 22 sub-codes. The Europe code (G2.2) is divided further into 4, of which one is the UK (G2.2.1), and this is divided again into its 4 constituent countries (G2.2.1.1 - G2.2.1.4).
G3 z ‘Oceans & seas’ is divided into 5 oceans, with the Atlantic (G3.1) divided into north (G3.2.1) and south (G3.2.2) and the north further divided into 10 separate sea regions (G3.2.1.1 - G3.2.1.10), and the Pacific (G3.3) split into north (G3.3.1) and south (G3.3.2) , with the north divided into two regions. There is one additional code in the G3 family (G3.6) for landlocked oceans and large salt lakes, with 3 sub-codes.
G4 z ‘climatic zones’ distinguishes only 2 zones at present, temperate (G4.1) and sub-tropical and tropical (G4.2); more may be added in the future. There is no G4 family code for arctic and sub-arctic climates because they coincide geographically with a continent (Antarctica, G2.1) and a region (Arctic & sub-arctic, G2.8), which have their own codes.
The top-level regional codes (G2, G3 and G4) are not used in coding: they have no function in describing projects, and are included only to make the code hierarchy easier to understand.
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Climatic zone codes are intended to be used as primaries only in cases where region (G2 or G3 family) codes would be inappropriate: when research focuses on phenomena that are climate-specific but spread across several regions, and the work is not particularly associated with any one or two in particular — on tropical forests in general, for example. In this case, region codes would still be preferred if the work involved field observations.
Climatic codes may also be used as secondaries when it is helpful to be more precise about location in a continent that spans radically different climates, such as North America, South America, or Asia.
It can be helpful to know whether research relates generally to one of these areas (work on South American rain forest, for example) or specifically to a local area within it (modelling flood risk from the River Severn). A ‘local area’ code (G5) is provided to use as a secondary in the latter case. Research which simply uses a small area as an example of a general case — testing a general model of flooding with data that happens to come from the Severn, for example — should not be given a G5 code.
research vs observation
In addition to the main descriptive codes, a full coding includes a 3-state flag which can be set to ‘Research’, ‘Research and Observation’ and ‘Observation’. These have the obvious meanings.
The flag is used for internal LWEC purposes.
important code combinations
It is generally straightforward to code projects which investigate either the state and working of the natural world or direct human interactions with it. It can be harder to code those which contribute to the development of government policy and services or simply enable future research — indirect interactions, sometimes at two removes. Work involving computer simulation and other kinds of models, and research on climate change, can cause difficulty, too. Fortunately, codings for situations like these often have char-acteristic ‘fingerprints’ — combinations of codes which stretch across the dimensions. This section discusses some of the most important of these.
projects involving models and modelling
Following the general rule that coding should focus on the outcome of projects rather than the means used to arrive at the outcome, pre-existing models which are simply used as tools in a project are ignored in coding (just like other tools such as mathematical techniques and measuring instru-ments). Models and modelling are recognised in coding only when a new model or an improve-ments to an existing model is the main outcome of a project, or an important part of it.
The codes required to describe the modelling aspects of the project — all primary apart from the C code, which may be primary or secondary depending on the context — are then:
C13.10.3 z ‘modelling techniques & tools’
D9 z ‘the non-natural world’
other D codes z which identify the aspect(s) of the natural world being modelled, if any (economic models, for example, would not have other D codes)
E1.1 z , if the model embodies new understanding of the natural world produced in the same project
E1.3 z ‘forecasting, hindcasting & developing scenarios’, if the work has simply increased the model’s value by making it more accurate, demonstrating that it is a good representation of the world (‘validating’ it), making the software run faster, or in some other way, and
EITHER
appropriate E5 codes z if the model forms part of a ‘solution’, as it usually does when work is funded by government departments or agencies. In this case, the C13.10.3 code is secondary, because the solution is the important outcome and C13.10.3 simply provides extra informa-tion about the form it takes.
OR
E7 z ‘projects concerned with enabling future environmental research’ if it is likely to be used mainly in future (usually academic) research. In this case the C13.10.3 is primary, because the model is an important outcome in itself.
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The project may also have G codes if the model represents a specific part of the world.
Other codes are, of course, always required to describe other aspects of the project. Government department and agency projects, for example, normally have a C13.9 ‘government policy & services’ code, and may have secondary C2-12 codes to identify a target industry, while research on a model intended to be used in industry would have appropriate C2-12 primary codes.
This pattern of codes is not a template that can be applied mechanistically whenever a project involves a model. Judgement is often required, for example, to decide whether the modelling aspect justifies inclusion in the coding and whether the model actually embodies new understanding of the natural world. There are also, inevitably, cases where the normal pattern needs to be modified. Nevertheless, it does apply in most cases, and it is always a useful guide.
funding for enabling and exploiting research
Other funding for enabling and exploiting research has a similar code ‘fingerprint’, except that E1 ‘Earth’ codes do not arise: E1.1 because no new understanding of the environment is ever involved and E1.3 because that only applies to models.
C13.10 and C13.11 codes are reserved specifi-cally for projects which aim to enable future (or exploit past) research and do not aim to produce original knowledge themselves. This is because most projects which do aim to produce original knowledge involve one or more of the activities described by these codes, and it would swamp database searches with false positives if they were reflected in the codings (and besides, they are rarely spelled out in project descriptions, so an unacceptable level of guesswork would be involved).
The key codes required to describe funding for enabling and exploitation — again all primary apart from the C code(s) — are therefore:
appropriate C13.10 z ‘scientific equipment & methods’ or C13.11 ‘enabling & exploitation of research’ codes
D9 z ‘the non-natural world’
other D codes z which identify the aspect(s) of the natural world they are associated with, if any. These are often required, for example, for research on or the procurement of new sensors and instruments, funding for management and collaboration (when it concerns a particular aspect of the environment), and collecting or hosting datasets and collections of physical specimens.
EITHER
appropriate E5 codes z if the activities are part of a ‘solution’ (usually the case when they are funded by government departments or agencies) rather than intended to enable research per se — research on measurement techniques for the Environment Agency to use in monitoring pollution, for example. In this case, the C13.10 or C13.11 codes are secondary.
OR
E7 z ‘projects concerned with enabling future environmental research’ if they are in the context of (usually academic) research. In this case the C codes are primary.
As in the case of work on models, other codes are required to complete the description.
Any D1-8 codes are primary because the associ-ated aspect of the natural world is a key aspect of activities like these — indeed, it is often mentioned in the project title. Making them primary also allows other D1-8 codes to be used without ambiguity as qualifiers or to identify secondary aspects. The presence of C13.10 or C13.11 and absence of E1 codes is enough to show that the project does not aim to produce any original knowledge about the environment.
Funding for dissemination of research results (C13.11.5) is a special case. This code is reserved for dissemination within the research community and government because dissemination to industry, commerce and the public has a specific ‘solution’ code (E5.C.4 ‘information services, education, training & public engagement’) which makes C13.11.5 superfluous. However, it is harmless to apply a C13.11.5 in addition to the E5.C.4 code.
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research on government policy and services
Government policy and services (with occasional exceptions) interact with the environment only at one remove: they only influence other people’s interactions with it.
As the previous discussion (page 21) explains, there are three different kinds of work to consider:
developing z policy or services — that is, improving existing ones or formulating new ones
informing z such developments, without consid-ering the policies or services themselves, and
delivering z services.
The key codes usually required to describe work on the development of policy or services are:
C13.9 z ‘government policy & services’, primary because the results first have to influence government action
C2 - C12 or C13.19 z secondaries to show whose actions will be affected by any change in policy or services that eventuates
D9 z ‘non-natural world’, primary because the work is primarily concerned with non-natural (human) activities
E5 ‘Solutions’ z primaries, because policy and services are always solutions. The E5.B facet code will usually show which aspect(s) of the environment are involved, if any, at least in broad terms.
D1-8 z secondaries to qualify the E5 codes if the solution has environmental aspects and they can help identify it in a more useful way.
Work which is intended simply to inform later development of policy or services is coded in the same way as similar academic work — that is, as research aimed at increasing knowledge about the natural world or a human interaction with it, rather than as part of a ‘solution’ — with the addition of a secondary C13.9 code to show its context. Projects like this normally have E1 - E4 (Earth, Pressure, Impact and Consequence respectively) rather than E5 primary EPICS codes, and their
primary Environmental Domain codes are more likely to be D1 - D8 than D9.
The key codes required to describe projects that simply deliver services to the private sector — for example producing an information leaflet based on research results — are:
C2-12 or C13.19 z primary codes to show who the service is intended to influence
D9 z ‘non-natural world’, primary
E5 ‘Solutions’ z primaries
D1-8 z secondaries to qualify these if this is helpful
A C13.9 secondary may be included to show the context of the work, but is not strictly necessary because this is evident from the funder.
Research which is intended to be directly helpful to industry — such as work on agricultural processes, funded by DEFRA to help farmers — is essentially a public service and coded in the same way. (The coding example on page 13 is a project of this kind.)
In all these cases, other primary and secondary codes are always required to complete the descrip-tion. Secondary E2, 3 and 4 (Pressure, Impact and Consequence) codes can be particulary useful to describe more clearly what problem ‘solutions’ address.
climate change research and the (e)-p-i-c-s chain
From a public policy perspective, climate change is probably the hottest topic in environmental research today. There is considerable interest in knowing what work is being done and how much is being spent on climate change and its various constituent aspects, and Envirobase is the best available tool for finding out. However, it can do so effectively only if projects are informatively coded.
The difficulty in identifying ‘climate change research’ in the database is that the concept is inherently imprecise, and the name means different things to different people. There is a wide range of work that some people would include and others exclude — and the more generous the
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some keys to good coding
A thorough understanding of the general z
principles of the classification scheme, and familiarity with the individual codes.
Careful, analytic reading of all the available z
information about each project and a pause for thought before starting to code it
A degree of scepticism z
Rigorous focus on the core reality of work z
in a project and of its outputs. It is what the researchers actually do and produce that determines primary codes; why they do it, and what the results might be used for, are secondary.
Intelligent use of codes: using them as z
they are defined in this manual and in hints as far as possible, but more flexibly when necessary — the designers of classification schemes cannot anticipate every possible situation
Respecting specific coding rules, such z
as always using the most specific codes possible
Thoughtful comparison between the z
completed coding and the project title and description, using the echo, and revising the coding if necessary until the echo gives a clear and accurate summary of the real work done in the project, and its context.
interpretation, the harder it tends to be to devise a database query which can reliably pick out ‘climate change’ research and provide a basis for analysing it. Current usage in government is typically at the generous end of the range.
Work on core topics such as climate modelling and the melting of ice sheets will certainly have codings readily recognisable as ‘climate change’, but codings of many other kinds of work can be ambiguous even if they are strictly accurate. Judicious addition of extra codes can usually avoid this, and they should be used when they can make a coding significantly more informative.
Only a proportion of the research on topics such as changes in the coastline, the spread of pathogens and efficient use of materials, for example, is related to climate change. Extra codes can often make it clear which is and which is not, if this can be decided from the project description.
The most commonly effective way to make codings more informative is to add one or more secondary EPICS codes to show what lies behind the topic under investigation in the P-I-C-S chain — the Pressure that leads to an Impact which leads to a Consequence and prompts a search for a Solution. It is often enough to go back one link in the chain — adding a Pressure secondary code to an Impact primary, or an Impact secondary to a Consequence primary, for example — but if secondary codes from even earlier links can add valuable informa-tion to a coding they should be used.
A project on changes in the coastline (with an E3.1.5.1 primary code), for example, should be given a secondary Pressures (E2 family) code to indicate the cause of the change, if this is clear and the extra code would allow work on change resulting from rising sea levels (which is ‘climate change research’) to be distinguished from work on change resulting from longshore drift (which is not).
The value of coding the P-I-C-S chain in this way is not limited to climate change projects: it can enrich codings in a range of contexts. It should always be considered, and done whenever it can add useful detail to the picture of a project painted by its coding. The worked example on p13 (Figure 6) shows just how worthwhile it can be.
mixed projects
Finally, it is worth reiterating that some projects include two or more different kinds of work; government projects, for example, may combine research on the state of the natural world with work on a Pressure (a human interaction with it) and on changes in policy as a potential Solution. Codes for these should be a judicious combina-tion of those that would be used for the various different kinds of work carried out in separate projects. When a particular code would be primary in one of these and secondary in another it becomes primary in the combined project.
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The Frascati system for classifying research was devised with the development of military hardware and comparable industrial R&D in mind, and it is difficult to apply to environmental research. It is interpreted as follows in Envirobase (with original source text in italics):
basic research (a1 & a2)
The Frascati Manual (2002) defines basic research as ‘experimental or theoretical work undertaken primarily to acquire new knowledge of the underlying foundation of phenomena and observ-able facts, without any particular application or use in view’. It ‘analyses properties, structures and relationships with a view to formulating and testing hypotheses, theories or laws’.
Basic research is pure (code A1) when it is ‘carried out for the advancement of knowledge, without seeking long-term economic or social benefits or making any effort to apply the results to practical problems or to transfer the results to sectors responsible for their application’.
It is oriented (A2) when it is ‘carried out with the expectation that it will produce a broad base of knowledge likely to form the basis of the solution to recognised or expected, current or future problems or possibilities’ and by implication if it does make ‘any effort to apply the results to practical problems or to transfer the results to sectors responsible for their application’.
The nearest example to LWEC’s field of interest in the Frascati Manual says that ‘determination of the amino acid sequence of an antibody molecule is basic research’ while ‘investigations undertaken in an effort to distinguish between antibodies for various diseases is applied research.’ Another example defines ‘study of the international factors influencing national economic development’ as basic research, but ‘study of the specific interna-tional factors determining the economic develop-ment of a country in a given period with a view to formulating an operational model for modifying government foreign trade policy’ as applied research (note: applied, not just oriented basic).
Annex A: FrAscAtI These examples suggest that research that aims to elucidate the mechanisms governing a natural process should be regarded as ‘basic’, even when it uses a specific example as a source of evidence, but if it focuses on specific examples for reasons other than experimental convenience — because they have a particular practical significance, for example — it is ‘applied’ or at least ‘oriented basic’. This suggests in turn that projects coded as ‘pure basic’ should normally have a ‘general support’ (B1) primary purpose code, and that it is rarely appropriate for projects with a primary purpose codes other than B1 to be coded as ‘pure basic’. None of the other Frascati categories, though, is related to a specific primary purpose category or categories.
Pure basic environmental research is funded almost exclusively by research councils, and accounts for only a small minority (around 20%) of their total funding for ‘basic’ research, most of which is oriented. Work funded by other public bodies is invariably directed towards a practical purpose, so in Frascati terms it is either ‘applied’ or ‘experi-mental development’.
applied research (a3 & a4)
Applied research is ‘original investigation … directed primarily towards a specific practical aim or objective.’ It is undertaken ‘either to determine possible uses for the findings of basic research or to determine new methods or ways of achieving specific and predetermined objectives. It involves considering the available knowledge and its extension in order to solve particular problems.’
Most research funded by government departments and agencies is ‘applied’ in Frascati terms. The balance between ‘strategic’ and ‘specific’ varies.
The Frascati Manual does not distinguish between strategic (A3) and specific (A4) applied research, which are UK-specific categories. However, it indicates that in UK usage applied research is strategic when it is ‘directed at a group of applications but not a particular application.’
UK sources (such as the OST’s Classification of SET and R&D activities: definitions) say that
ANNEx A: fRASCATI
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applied research is strategic when it is ‘directed toward practical aims, but has not yet advanced to the stage where eventual applications can be clearly specified’.
It is specific when it ‘has quite specific and detailed products, processes, systems, etc as its aims’.
experimental development (a5)
Experimental development is relatively clearly defined. It is ‘systematic work, drawing on knowledge gained from research and practical experience, that is directed to producing new materials, products and devices; to installing new processes, systems and services; or to improving substantially those already produced or installed.’
The distinction between ‘applied research’ and ‘experimental development’ turns essentially on the degree of originality involved, and whether any new knowledge is expected. Projects in Envirobase are by definition ‘research’, so they rarely fall on the ‘experimental development’ side of the boundary.
non-frascati (a6)
Funding is non-Frascati when it is for non- R&D activities which are included in the science, engi-neering and technology (SET) budget. Funding for technology transfer (Primary Purpose B5) and taught course awards such as MScs (Primary Purpose B6) are the main examples.
ANNEx A: fRASCATI
39ANNEx B: PRImARY PURPOSE
Annex B: prImAry purposeThe government’s Primary Purpose classification system is interpreted as follows:
general support (b1, ppa1)
General support is funding for basic and applied research and development which is provided to advance knowledge for its own sake. It includes applied research where there is no evident connec-tion to a specific Government policy, and support for post-graduate research studentships (PhDs).
Awards for taught courses such as Masters degrees are not considered to be R&D expenditure and have a specific code of their own (B6, ppF).
It can be difficult to decide whether NERC projects should be coded ‘general support’ (B1) or ‘policy support’ (B3) because NERC’s programmes are increasingly directed towards policy objectives. Funding for most NERC projects, including almost all PhD projects, is conventionally regarded as general support (B1), but around 20% are indisputably‘policy support’ (B3) and 10% are ‘technology support’ (B4).
The general support code B1 is inappropriate when the research is explicitly and largely concerned with:
anthropogenic pressures or impacts on the z
environment (such as man-made pollution and climate change), including ways to alleviate or prevent them, or
with natural mechanisms that are involved z
in anthropogenic impacts and would not otherwise be studied, AND (c) the project is sufficiently substantive to have realistic prospects of influencing policy.
A few other types of NERC project, such as work on new sensors and instruments, may also be appropriately coded as policy support (B3) or technology support (B4).
Research on important natural processes that
1 ppA, ppB etc are the abbreviations in general use in government.
would be studied anyway, such as climate, is normally coded as general support even when it is relevant to policy.
government services (b2, ppb)
This classification is used for research carried out to support the provision of government services under the established interpretation of existing legislation, including work on their rationale, objectives, scope, content, present performance, future needs, the resources required to meet them, and ways to make them more effective and to improve the efficiency with which resources are used.
The definition of government services includes services both provided directly to the British public (such health, education, social security, police and justice) and indirect services such as defence, whether they are provided directly by government or delivered by agents such as the Environment Agency and the Meteorological Office acting on behalf of government. DFID research is also included because its work is regarded as a service to developing countries provided by Government on behalf of the electorate.
The key distinction between government services (B2) and policy support (B3), is that government services are concerned with the implementation of existing policy, whereas policy support is concerned with the development of future policy, which may be implemented through new legisla-tion or a new ministerial decision under existing legislation.
The government services classification includes R&D to support government procurement decisions, and to develop technology mainly used by government, such as specialised equipment used by government and its agencies to provide services. This includes technology to appraise alternative means of controlling environmental problems, but public support for the development of commercial products and services is classified as technology support (B4).
The majority of the Environment Agency’s R&D aims to support the implementation of existing policy, and so falls into the government services
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classification. However, some of its R&D is carried out to provide expert input to the development of future policy, and this falls into policy support.
policy support (b3, ppc)
This classification is used for all research which Government funds in order to inform the develop-ment of policy and potential future legislation and ministerial decisions.
This includes work carried out to ‘monitor developments of significance for the welfare of the population’, work to support intervention in forms such as public information, regulation, legisla-tion and taxation and other ways of influencing the behaviour of individuals and organisations (including industry), and work to promote economic prosperity.
Policy support includes R&D into subjects such as global warming or other pollution hazards, health and safety at work, safety of food and other products, effects of fishing on fish stocks and animal welfare. It covers work commissioned to better understand the causes and consequences of these phenomena, and research to determine the need for intervention and to help define the form the intervention should take.
Work on these topics funded by a research council rather than a government department is only regarded as policy support if it is unambiguously intended, and likely, to ‘inform the development of policy’ — if that is really is its ‘Primary Purpose’. This is the case for only a few research council-funded projects; most have no channel through which their results could feed into policy, and their results are not of a kind that policy-makers could use.
technology support (b4, ppd)
This is support for R&D which Government decides to fund in order to advance the technology of the UK economy, that is, the technology of commercial goods and services. It includes research under schemes which have the eventual development of technology in businesses as an objective.
Some new knowledge is expected to result: a straightforward demonstration project, for example, showing off an established techology to a group of potential users unfamiliar with it would be regarded as commercialisation/technology transfer (ppD) and coded B5.
commercialisation/technology transfer (b5, ppe)
This is defined as ‘activities that encourage the exploitation of knowledge in a different place from its origin’.
taught course awards (b6, ppf) and primarily non-government funded (b7)
These are both self-explanatory.
ANNEx B: PRImARY PURPOSE
41
dimension a: frascati
a1 pure basic research
a2 oriented basic research
a3 applied strategic research
a4 Applied specific research
a5 experimental development
a6 non-frascati
dimension b: primary purpose
b1 ppa general support (projects & phd studentships)
b2 ppb government services
b3 ppc policy support
b4 ppd technology support
b5 ppe commercialisation/ technology transfer
b6 ppf taught course awards (msc/mres training)
b7 primarily non-government-funded
Annex c: the clAssIFIcAtIon hIerArchy
ANNEx C: THE CLASSIfICATION HIERARCHY
Dimensions A: frascat i & B: Pr imary Purpose
42
dimension c: human domain
c1 the natural world
c2 agriculture, horticulture, forestry & land management
c2.1 agriculture & horticulture
c2.2 forestry
c2.3 land management
c3 fishing & aquaculture
c4 food processing
c5 fuel production and power generation
c5.1 fossil fuel production
C5.1.1 coal production
C5.1.2 oil production
C5.1.3 natural gas production
c5.2 power generation from fossil fuels
c5.3 nuclear power
c5.4 renewable energy
C5.4.1 tidal energy
C5.4.2 wind energy
C5.4.3 biomass & biofuels
C5.4.4 energy from waste
C5.4.5 large-scale hydro power
C5.4.9 other renewable energy sources
c5.5 other energy technologies & fuels
C5.5.1 energy storage technologies for use with intermittent sources
C5.5.2 fuel cells
C5.5.3 heat pumps
C5.5.4 hydrogen
C5.5.9 other energy technologies & fuels
c6 utilities & related public services
c6.1 water supply & river basin management
c6.2 waste management
C6.2.1 sewage & other water-borne biodegradable waste management
C6.2.2 biodegradable solid waste management
C6.2.3 non-biodegradable solid waste management
C6.2.4 hazardous & other special waste management
c6.3 electricity & natural gas distribution, & telecoms
c7 extractive & manufacturing industries
c7.1 extraction & processing of non-fuel minerals
c7.2 extraction & processing of metals
c7.3 manufacture of plastics & polymers
c7.4 manufacture of timber, paper, board etc
c7.5 engineering manufacture
c7.6 electronics manufacture
c7.7 chemicals & pharmaceuticals manufacture
c7.9 other extraction & manufacturing processes
Dimension C: Human Domain
ANNEx C: THE CLASSIfICATION HIERARCHY
43
c8 construction
c8.1 buildings
c8.2 infrastructure
c9 transport
c9.1 road transport
c9.2 rail transport
c9.3 sea transport
c9.4 air transport
c10 Private sector commerce & office-based services
c11 public, education & health sectors
c12 private households
c13 cross-sector & indirect
c13.1 population growth
c13.2 large-scale migration
c13.3 development, economic growth & globalisation
c13.4 urban affairs
c13.5 rural affairs
c13.6 economics & markets
c13.7 human safety & health
c13.8 human psychology, attitudes, knowledge, lifestyle, culture & behaviour
c13.9 government policy & services
C13.9.1 horizon scanning & Foresight
C13.9.2 review & evidence collection
C13.9.3 evaluation
c13.10 scientific equipment & methods
C13.10.1 sensors, instruments & techniques for using them
C13.10.2 other scientific equipment
C13.10.3 modelling techniques & models
C13.10.4 risk, probability & uncertainty assessment methods
C13.10.5 Life Cycle Analysis (LCA) & other sustainability analysis tools & metrics
C13.10.6 Whole Life Costing (WLC), cost-benefit & other economic analysis tools & metrics
C13.10.9 other research tools & methods
c13.11 enabling & exploitation of research
C13.11.1 infrastructure, equipment & overheads
C13.11.2 assembling & hosting datasets & collections of physical specimens
C13.11.3 research management & co-ordination
C13.11.4 networking & collaboration costs
C13.11.5 dissemination
C13.11.6 building & maintenance of research capacity
c13.12 education & training in environmental fields and in research
C13.12.1 Doctoral research
C13.12.2 Masters and other courses
c13.19 multiple or unknown sectors, & other indirect
44ANNEx C: THE CLASSIfICATION HIERARCHY
Dimension D: Environmental Domain
dimension d: environmental domain
d1 earth system
d1.1 climate & weather processes & systems
D1.1.1 the carbon cycle
D1.1.2 the water cycle
D1.1.3 major temporal cycles
D1.1.4 other large-scale, cross-domain systems
d1.9 other aspects of the earth system
d2 lithosphere
d2.1 land & landscape
D2.1.1 coast & seashore
D2.1.2 low-lying land
D2.1.3 upland & mountain areas
D2.1.4 cultivated land
D2.1.5 managed land
D2.1.6 natural forest
D2.1.7 natural grassland, heath & scrub
D2.1.8 deserts
D2.1.9 other wild land (bare mountains etc)
D2.1.10 towns, cities & other built-up areas, transport infrastructure and derelict industrial land
d2.2 soils & sediments
D2.2.1 soils and other natural loose materials on the land surface
D2.2.2 sediments
d2.3 fossil fuels
D2.3.1 coal
D2.3.2 oil
D2.3.3 natural gas
d2.4 other minerals of economic value
D2.4.1 minerals used in construction
D2.4.2 metal ores
D2.4.9 other minerals
d2.5 Earth history evidence
d2.6 other land surface, continental crust, and geodesy
d2.7 oceanic crust, and the Earth’s mantle & core
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d3 hydrosphere
d3.1 freshwater
D3.1.1 complete drainage basin
D3.1.2 groundwater
D3.1.3 rivers, streams, drainage channels & canals
D3.1.4 freshwater lochs, lakes & ponds
D3.1.5 freshwater marshes, bogs, swamps & other wetlands
D3.1.6 beds & margins of rivers, freshwater lochs, lakes etc
d3.2 salt water
D3.2.1 inshore & coastal water
D3.2.2 other continental shelf & shallow seas
D3.2.3 deep oceans
D3.2.4 seabed
D3.2.5 currents & tides
d3.3 brackish water
D3.3.1 tidal estuaries, sea lochs & fiords
D3.3.2 salt marshes & brackish lagoons
D3.3.3 beds & margins of estuaries, sea lochs, fiords, brackish lagoons etc
d3.4 snow & ice
D3.4.1 polar ice sheets, sea ice, glaciers & snow cover
D3.4.2 non-polar glaciers & snow cover
d4 atmosphere
d4.1 atmosphere dynamics & transport (winds etc)
d4.2 atmosphere composition & chemistry
d4.3 water in the atmosphere (clouds, precipitation etc)
d4.4 atmosphere-surface interaction
d4.5 local & regional processes in the atmosphere
d4.9 other processes in the atmosphere
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Dimension D: Environmental Domain (continued)
d5 biosphere
d5.1 biological processes & systems which are not species-specific
d5.2 individual families, genera, species etc, or interactions between specific species etc
D5.2.1 man
D5.2.2 other mammals
D5.2.3 fish
D5.2.4 amphibians & reptiles
D5.2.5 birds
D5.2.6 arthropods
D5.2.7 other non-mammalian animals
D5.2.8 land & aquatic plants
D5.2.9 fungi & lichens
D5.2.10 monera (eubacteria & archaea), protista & green algae
D5.2.11 viruses, prions & other non-cellular entities
d5.3 cellular & genetic-level
d5.4 habitats
d5.5 ecosystems (biomes), ecology & biodiversity
d5.6 animals & plants used as food
d5.7 animals & plants exploited commercially for uses other than food
d5.8 ecosystem services
d5.9 cross-family groups
D5.9.1 plankton
D5.9.9 other cross-family groups
d6 space
d7 natural hazards
d7.1 volcanoes
d7.2 earthquakes
d7.3 tsunamis
d7.4 extreme offshore ocean waves
d7.5 landslides, mud slides, avalanches & subsidence
d7.6 severe or prolonged heavy precipitation & storm surges
d7.7 extreme winds
d7.8 flooding
d7.9 heatwaves, droughts & wildfires
d7.10 impacts from space
d7.19 other natural hazards
d8 cross-domain
d9 the non-natural world
Dimension D: Environmental Domain
ANNEx C: THE CLASSIfICATION HIERARCHY
47Dimension E: EPICS
dimension e: epicse1 earth
e1.1 understanding the behaviour of natural entities, processes & systems e1.2 field observation of the environment
E1.2.1 short-term data collectionE1.2.2 long-term monitoring
e1.3 forecasting, hindcasting & developing scenariose2 pressures
e2.1 depletion of limited natural resourcesE2.1.1 extraction & use of coal, oil gas & uraniumE2.1.2 extraction & use of other metalsE2.1.3 extraction & use of other mineralsE2.1.4 destruction of virgin and unmanaged forestsE2.1.5 harvesting of fish & other wild animalsE2.1.6 harvesting of other wild plantsE2.1.7 use of freshwaterE2.1.8 destruction of countrysideE2.1.19 depletion of other natural material resources
e2.2 polluting activitiese2.2.a by type of pollution
E2.2.A.1 emission of carbon dioxideE2.2.A.2 emission of methaneE2.2.A.3 emission of other significant greenhouse gases, & ozone-depleting gasesE2.2.A.4 release of other organic chemicals, and organic materialsE2.2.A.5 release of NOx &SOxE2.2.A.6 release of nitrates, nitrites, ammonia & phosphatesE2.2.A.7 release of heavy metalsE2.2.A.8 release of other chemicals & toxic elementsE2.2.A.9 release of particulatesE2.2.A.10 release of pathogenic organisms & other biological entities such as genesE2.2.A.11 release of radioactive materials & ionising radiationE2.2.A.12 emission of light & other electromagnetic radiationE2.2.A.13 production of noise & vibrationE2.2.A.14 release of odourE2.2.A.19 release of other specific types of pollutionE2.2.A.20 release of non-specific pollution - airborneE2.2.A.21 release of non-specific pollution - waterborneE2.2.A.22 release of non-specific pollution - ground-borne
e2.2.b by source of pollutionE2.2.B.1 leakage of hazardous substances during their extraction, manufacture, transport or processingE2.2.B.2 waste by-products of industrial (including agricultural) processesE2.2.B.3 waste materials (end of life)E2.2.B.4 usageE2.2.B.9 non-specific or other source of pollution
e2.3 intervention in natural processesE2.3.1 intervention in the carbon cycle by agriculture, forestry etcE2.3.2 intervention in land drainage characteristics, river flow & coastal erosionE2.3.3 genetic modificationE2.3.4 introduction of alien speciesE2.3.9 other intervention in natural processes
48ANNEx C: THE CLASSIfICATION HIERARCHY
Dimension E: EPICS
Dimension E: EPICS (continued)
e3 impacts
e3.1 impacts on the climate, land, water & air
E3.1.1 changes in the climate & weather
E3.1.1.1 change in air temperatures
E3.1.1.2 change in amount & seasonality of precipitation
E3.1.1.3 change in frequency & severity of extreme weather events
E3.1.1.9 other changes in the climate & weather
E3.1.2 other changes in the atmosphere
E3.1.2.1 changes in the ozone layer
E3.1.2.2 changes in greenhouse gas concentrations
E3.1.2.3 other atmospheric pollution
E3.1.2.9 other changes in the atmosphere
E3.1.3 changes in seas & oceans
E3.1.3.1 change in sea temperatures
E3.1.3.2 changes in ocean currents
E3.1.3.3 changes in sea ice
E3.1.3.4 change in sea levels
E3.1.3.5 acidification of seas & oceans
E3.1.3.6 pollution of seas & oceans
E3.1.3.9 other changes in seas & oceans
E3.1.4 changes in bodies of fresh or brackish water
E3.1.4.1 acidification of fresh & brackish water
E3.1.4.2 pollution by excess nutrients & eutrophication
E3.1.4.9 other pollution of fresh & brackish water
E3.1.4.10 changes in size and/or course of bodies of fresh or brackish water
E3.1.4.19 other changes in bodies of fresh or brackish water
E3.1.5 changes in the land
E3.1.5.1 changes in the coastline, beaches & near-shore seabed
E3.1.5.2 changes in amount & quality of soils & other loose surface materials elsewhere on land
E3.1.5.3 changes in the extent of continental ice sheets & glaciers
E3.1.5.4 changes in carbon storage in soils
E3.1.5.9 other changes in the land
e3.2 impacts on flora & fauna
E3.2.1 change in or loss of biodiversity
E3.2.2 changes in, damage to or loss of ecosystems
E3.2.3 changes in, damage to or loss of habitats
E3.2.4 changes in population, distribution & migration of specific species
E3.2.5 genetic changes in, or damage to, specific species & genera
E3.2.6 changes in plant growth
E3.2.7 changes in carbon absorption capacity of plants & vegetated land
E3.2.9 other changes in flora & fauna
e3.3 short-term impacts
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e4 consequences
e4.1 consequences for non-food material resources
E4.1.1 availability of fossil fuels, plastics & other materials derived from oil
E4.1.2 availability of metals
E4.1.3 availability of timber & non-food crops
E4.1.4 availability of fertile land or soils
E4.1.9 other consequences for non-food material resources
e4.2 consequences for food & water supplies
E4.2.1 consequences for fish stocks
E4.2.2 consequences for production of other animal-based foods
E4.2.3 consequences for food & forage crop production
E4.2.4 consequences for drinking & sanitary water
E4.2.9 other consequences for food supplies
E4.2.6 other consequences for water supplies
e4.3 consequences for the built environment and human life
E4.3.1 danger & damage from flooding
E4.3.2 loss of land to the sea
E4.3.2.1 from coastal erosion
E4.3.2.2 from rising sea levels
E4.3.3 danger & damage from extreme winds
E4.3.4 danger & damage from earthquakes
E4.3.5 danger & damage from tsunamis
E4.3.6 other damage to buildings & infrastructure
E4.3.9 other consequences for the built environment or human life
e4.4 consequences for human health
E4.4.1 health effects of air, surface water and ground pollution
E4.4.2 health effects from pollution of food or water used for drinking, cooking or personal hygiene
E4.4.3 health effects of extreme temperatures, climate change etc
E4.4.4 health effects of ionising & electromagnetic radiation
E4.4.5 health effects of pathogen transmission, evolution & spread
E4.4.9 other effects of environmental factors on health
e4.5 consequences for wealth & quality of life
E4.5.1 economic consequences for countries, firms or individuals
E4.5.2 threats to security and social stability
E4.5.3 changes in amount of countryside & green space & in landscape quality
E4.5.9 other consequences for wealth & quality of life
e4.6 projects concerned with multiple consequences
E4.6.1 consequences of climate change
E4.6.9 other work concerned with multiple consequences
50ANNEx C: THE CLASSIfICATION HIERARCHY
Dimension E: EPICS
Dimension E: EPICS (continued)
e5 solutionse5.a Purpose of solution
e5.a.1 prevention or reduction of future damage to the environment, & better use of natural resourcese5.a.2 mitigation/remediation of past damage to the environment & environmental improvemente5.a.3 mitigation of & adaptation to effects on man
e5.b Technical nature of solutione5.b.1 solutions mainly benefiting climate change and/or supplies of energy & oil-based materials
E5.B.1.1 carbon capture and storageE5.B.1.2 maintenance & improvement of carbon sinks, and geoengineeringE5.B.1.3 changes in carbon-intensity of fuel mix
E5.B.1.3.1 hydrogen as a fuelE5.B.1.3.2 substituting gas for coal & oilE5.B.1.3.9 other changes in carbon-intensity of fuel mix
E5.B.1.4 nuclear energyE5.B.1.5 renewable energyE5.B.1.6 energy efficiency in industry and end uses
E5.B.1.6.1 more efficient use of energy in industrial processesE5.B.1.6.2 energy-efficient transport technologyE5.B.1.6.3 energy-efficient building fabricE5.B.1.6.4 energy-efficient heating & cooling systemsE5.B.1.6.5 energy-efficient lightsE5.B.1.6.6 energy-efficient small appliancesE5.B.1.6.9 energy efficiency improvements in other end uses
E5.B.1.7 other energy technologies & fuelsE5.B.1.8 changes in modes & use of transportE5.B.1.9 improved extraction & use of depleted, lower-grade and novel oil, gas & uranium resourcesE5.B.1.10 change to materials with lower embodied energyE5.B.1.11 improved power generation & transmission efficiencyE5.B.1.12 more efficient use of materials & dematerialisationE5.B.1.13 minimisation of methane release from biodegradable wastesE5.B.1.14 minimisation of methane production from livestockE5.B.1.19 other solutions related to human influence on the climate and/or supplies of energy & oil-based materials
e5.b.2 solutions mainly benefiting supplies of other finite material resourcesE5.B.2.1 resource efficiency & dematerialisationE5.B.2.2 better exploration, higher mineral extraction rates & use of lower-grade resourcesE5.B.2.3 more sustainable exploitation of wild flora & fauna
E5.B.2.3.1 more sustainable exploitation of virgin & unmanaged forestsE5.B.2.3.2 more sustainable exploitation of other wild plantsE5.B.2.3.3 more sustainable exploitation of wild animals (including birds & fish)
E5.B.2.4 recycling, recovery & re-useE5.B.2.5 material substitution to preserve resourcesE5.B.2.9 other solutions related to finite material resources
e5.b.3 solutions mainly benefiting land, water and air qualityE5.B.3.1 land use & managementE5.B.3.2 reduction of pollution at source or limitation in its spreadE5.B.3.3 waste reduction, change to biodegradable materials & better waste managementE5.B.3.4 remediation (including bioremediation) & improvement of land & soilE5.B.3.5 remediation & improvement of the sea, rivers, lakes etcE5.B.3.9 other solutions related to land, soil & water qualityE5.B.3.10 other solutions related to air quality
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e5.b.4 solutions mainly benefiting flora & faunaE5.B.4.1 maintenance & improvement of habitats & ecosystemsE5.B.4.2 conservation or control of specific speciesE5.B.4.9 other solutions related to fauna & flora
e5.b.5 solutions mainly benefiting supplies of food, water & material resources derived from plants & animalsE5.B.5.1 genetic modification, storage of genetic resourcesE5.B.5.2 improved production methods
E5.B.5.2.1 improvements in crop productionE5.B.5.2.2 improvements in animal husbandryE5.B.5.2.3 improvements in the fishing industry (including aquaculture)E5.B.5.2.4 more sustainable exploitation of other wild animals used for foodE5.B.5.2.5 more sustainable exploitation of wild plants used for foodE5.B.5.2.6 improvements in food processing, distribution & retailE5.B.5.2.9 other improvements in food production & manufacturing
E5.B.5.3 more selective use of and improved antibiotics, hormones & pesticidesE5.B.5.4 other solutions related to food suppliesE5.B.5.5 water use efficiency & demand managementE5.B.5.6 increased & alternative water resources
E5.B.5.6.1 improvements in conventional water supplyE5.B.5.6.2 grey water recyclingE5.B.5.6.3 desalinationE5.B.5.6.4 other alternative water resources
E5.B.5.9 other solutions related to water resources for human usee5.b.6 solutions mainly benefiting the built environment or human life
E5.B.6.1 risk assessment, forecasting, warning, protection & reliefE5.B.6.2 coastal defences & managed abandonmentE5.B.6.3 land drainage & river basin managementE5.B.6.4 planning & design of the built environmentE5.B.6.9 other solutions related to the built environment or human life
e5.b.7 solutions directly benefiting human healthe5.b.8 solutions mainly benefiting wealth & quality of life
E5.B.8.1 landscape preservation, restoration & improvementE5.B.8.2 environmentally-related improvements to amenityE5.B.8.3 economic diversification & developmentE5.B.8.9 other solutions related to wealth or quality of life
e5.b.9 solutions with several areas of benefit and/or involving several technical componentse5.c Implementation route
e5.c.1 improvements in commerce, industry & private lifee5.c.2 improvements in public servicese5.c.3 improvements in environmental policy, legal & economic instruments
E5.C.3.1 control of hazardous substances and activitiesE5.C.3.2 environmental & pollution monitoring & controlE5.C.3.3 taxes & other financial influencesE5.C.3.4 urban & land use planning, Building Regulations etcE5.C.3.5 other national market regulation & interventionE5.C.3.6 international law, trade rules, aid & debt reliefE5.C.3.9 other policy, legislation & economic instruments
e5.c.4 information services, education, training & public engagemente5.c.9 unknown implementation route
e6 projects explicitly or implicitly concerned with several pressures, impacts, consequences and/or solutionse7 projects concerned with enabling future environmental research
52ANNEx C: THE CLASSIfICATION HIERARCHY
Dimension G: Geography
dimension g: geographyg1 global scale, & spaceg2 continents & regions
g2.1 Arctic & sub-arcticg2.2 Europe
G2.2.1 United KingdomG2.2.1.1 EnglandG2.2.1.2 Northern IrelandG2.2.1.3 ScotlandG2.2.1.4 Wales
G2.2.2 EireG2.2.3 Scandinavia, Iceland & the Baltic statesG2.2.4 other northern & central EuropeG2.2.5 southern Europe
g2.3 AsiaG2.3.1 Middle EastG2.3.2 the Indian sub-continentG2.3.3 the Far East & South-East AsiaG2.3.4 RussiaG2.3.5 Central Asia
g2.4 North Americag2.5 Central & South Americag2.6 Africag2.7 Australasia & Oceaniag2.8 Antarctic
g3 oceans & seasg3.1 Arctic Oceang3.2 Atlantic
G3.2.1 North AtlanticG3.2.1.1 Hebrides areaG3.2.1.2 Irish SeaG3.2.1.3 Celtic SeaG3.2.1.4 Bristol ChannelG3.2.1.5 English ChannelG3.2.1.6 North SeaG3.2.1.7 Baltic SeaG3.2.1.8 Bay of BiscayG3.2.1.9 MediterraneanG3.2.1.10 other North Atlantic
G3.2.2 South Atlanticg3.3 Pacific
G3.3.1 North PacificG3.3.1.1 south-east Asian seasG3.3.1.2 other North Pacific
G3.3.2 South Pacificg3.4 Indian Ocean
g3.5 Southern Oceang3.6 Landlocked seas & large salt lakes
G3.6.1 Caspian SeaG3.6.2 Aral SeaG3.6.3 other landlocked seas & large salt lakes
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g4 climatic zones
g4.1 temperate
g4.2 tropical & sub-tropical
g5 Specific location(s)g6 non-geographic
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