Ordnance Survey has launched OS Enhanced Land Cover (ELC) Beta, a national habitat-mapping dataset that fuses OS National Geographic Database topography, OS aerial imagery, OS Terrain 5 and third-party sources including Natural England’s Living England, the Rural Payments Agency’s Crop Map of England and UKHab classifications to support 10% Biodiversity Net Gain (BNG) assessments. The tool enables desktop and field workflows for ecologists and developers, with Wessex Water using it via Linckia’s ESRI-based Habitat Fabric platform to assess hundreds of sites in a single spatial view. Linckia reports a 40% cut in data processing costs versus previous methods, rising to 90% compared with processing raw imagery, with OS claiming time savings of days to weeks per development across 1.5 million homes in the pipeline.

Construction firms facing 2026’s cost inflation, labour shortages and volatile materials prices are being pushed towards digital tools such as 4D BIM sequencing, common data environments and site-based tablets for real-time progress tracking. The opinion piece argues that standardising workflows through platforms like Autodesk Construction Cloud or Trimble Viewpoint can cut rework and claims disputes, while sensor-based monitoring of plant and temporary works improves utilisation and early risk detection. For engineers, the message is to prioritise interoperable systems, structured data capture and training budgets over one-off gadget purchases.

Emerson has released DeltaV Live Enterprise View, a browser-based application that extends DeltaV™ distributed control system visualisation securely from the control room to any authorised device on the industrial edge. The software provides real-time operations intelligence to engineering, maintenance, reliability and management teams, integrating with Emerson’s wider edge ecosystem for process control and asset monitoring. For mines running dispersed processing plants and remote infrastructure, this enables site-wide situational awareness without duplicating SCADA screens or exposing core control networks.