Unit of Assessment 7
Earth Systems and Environmental Sciences

Our submission in Earth Systems and Environmental Sciences encompasses research in the Department of Meteorology and the environmental science component of the Department of Geography & Environmental Science. Our research focuses on the natural science of the environment, how it responds to and recovers from anthropogenic and natural perturbations, the science of prediction, and the interplay between our environment, lives and livelihoods.

• Top 10 in UK for Earth Systems and Environmental Sciences.
• Ranked 9th in UK for Grade Point Average (research quality).
• Ranked 3rd in UK for research power.
• 97% of our research is rated world-leading (4*) and internationally excellent (3*).
• 100% of our research impact is rated 4* (outstanding) and 3* (with considerable significance).
• 100% of environment submission rated 4* (conducive to world-leading research and outstanding impact).

Our research is organised into four Divisions:

• Climate: provides research on the coupled atmosphere-ocean-cryosphere-land system, ranging from fundamental processes to global climate prediction, impacts on human and natural systems, and synergies with weather dynamics in climate-related extremes.
• Earth Observation and Space: exploits satellite and other observations to improve understanding of the solid Earth, the oceans, the atmosphere, the magnetosphere and the solar system environment.
• Environmental Science: focuses on critical-zone functioning and related services and risks (such as floods, droughts, heatwaves, fires, glacier retreat, and exposure to pesticides and pollution) on a range of scales.
• Weather: conducts weather-scale research with an emphasis on high-impact weather and its relation to climate-scale processes.

Meteorology includes significant components of two Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) research centres: the National Centre for Atmospheric Science and the National Centre for Earth Observation. Co-located with Meteorology is by far the largest group of Met Office research staff in any UK university. Together with the University’s School of Agriculture, Policy & Development, we lead the Loddon Observatory. The University is also lead partner in, and hosts, the Institute of Environmental Analytics.

A broad interdisciplinary perspective is achieved via two University Interdisciplinary Research Centres:

• The Walker Institute: focuses on the development of climate-resilient and sustainable livelihoods, in some of the world’s most vulnerable regions.
• The Centre for the Mathematics of Planet Earth: aims to catalyse initiatives at the intersection between mathematics, theoretical physics, and earth sciences.

During the REF2021 period we received nearly £100 million in research income from a wide variety of sources.

Staff and doctoral students

Our research community consists of more than 300 staff and doctoral students. We submitted 89 staff (83.9 FTE) to REF2021, including 44 Professors, 28 Associate Professors, 4 Lecturers and 17 Research Fellows; 13 are Early Career Researchers. Over the assessment period, there were 160 doctoral completions. We generally have about 105 research students at any one time; in 2019/20 they came from 34 countries including the UK.

We are involved in several doctoral training programmes which facilitate interdisciplinary interactions and cement and expand our industry and policy partner engagement:

• We lead the NERC-funded Doctoral Training Partnership (DTP) SCENARIO (Science of the Environment: Natural and Anthropogenic pRocesses, Impacts and Opportunities) (cohorts starting 2014-24).
• We co-lead, with Imperial College, the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council Centre for Doctoral Training (CDT) in the Mathematics of Planet Earth (cohorts started 2014-18).
• We are one of 3 HEI host institutes of NERC’s CDT in Quantitative and Modelling Skills in Ecology and Evolution (cohorts started 2017-20).

Research centres and partnerships

• Met Office Academic Partnership: we are one of six universities in this collaboration to advance the science and skill of weather and climate prediction.
• European Centre for Medium-range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF): we have collaborated on 50 projects since 2014. ECMWF’s new headquarters will be built at the University’s Whiteknights campus. 
• Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC): we are heavily involved in IPCC Assessment Reports and provided 6 lead authors for its recent Physical Science assessment, more than any other institution worldwide.
• National Physical Laboratory (NPL): via a Memorandum of Understanding, including a jointly funded chair and a jointly funded fellowship, we work closely with NPL on Earth Observation science.

Sector recognition

Selected examples of national and international recognition between 2014 and 2020:

• Queen’s Anniversary Prize: awarded to the University for its work ‘Tackling the Impacts of Climate Change - From Global to Local'
• Regius Professorship in Meteorology and Climate Science: conferred to the University by Her Majesty the Queen
• Four Fellows of the Royal Society (Professors Mike Lockwood, Keith Shine, Ted Shepherd, Jonathan Gregory)
• Royal Society Kavli Medal and Lecture 2018 (Professor Ed Hawkins)
• OBE ‘for services to flood forecasting and the development of hazard early warning systems’ (Professor Hannah Cloke)
• MBE ‘for services to climate science and science communication’ (Professor Ed Hawkins)

Examples of the impact our research has had at local, national and global levels.