A Sustainability Geoscope: defining an integrated information base for interdisciplinary modeling of global change

The 21 century will be characterized by global change at an unprecedented scale. Human activity on the planet has reached a dimension which alters the earth system as a whole, mainly as a combination of population growth, resource use, waste disposal, and technological advances. In order to meet the challenges of global change, human society has to develop a more comprehensive global information base to guide informed economic, social and environmental action in a transition to sustainability. An emerging sustainability science and its cross-disciplinary theoretical concepts will require more integrated data sets and modeling tools to provide systematic, structured analyses of global change issues. Integrated modeling efforts will contribute to bridging the traditional gaps between natural and social sciences, and this will in turn raise the demand for data of a new quality, especially in economics and social sciences. At the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK) recently the idea of a “Sustainability Geoscope” has evolved. The Geoscope will provide a framework for an observation and monitoring system on a global scale, comprising economic, social, environmental and institutional issues. Data sources will be a combination of satellite remote sensing with on-the-ground observations. The objective of this paper is to present the Geoscope idea and discuss possible connections and mutual benefits with recent efforts in global economic data collection and analysis. 2