The NBN Atlas Scotland was created in 2015 to provide a platform for the collection, aggregation, analysis and use of biological data in Scotland.

Go to the NBN Atlas Scotland

The Atlas has been created as a daughter website to Scotland’s Environment Web. It is also a pilot for a potential UK-wide initiative to develop new biodiversity data infrastructure for the entire United Kingdom. The objectives of the NBN Atlas are about education, promotion of biodiversity and providing a trusted portal for Scottish biodiversity data.

Many people and organisations in Scotland are involved in observing, monitoring and recording nature including government and non-government organisations, research and educational institutions, Local Environmental Record Centres, museums and botanic gardens, community groups and national and regional biological recording schemes and societies. This Atlas provides a platform to bring the data, collected by these organisations, together, and to merge them with other environmental data such as spatial layers for soil, climate and habitats. This initiative would not be possible were it not for the work of our Atlas Data Partners in monitoring and recording species and habitats across Scotland, most of which is done by volunteers and citizen scientists.

All species data held within the Atlas are automatically displayed at a resolution appropriate to the sensitivity of the species in accordance with the Scottish Natural Heritage sensitive species list.  You can see the full sensitive species list on the NBN Atlas

The NBN Atlas Scotland has been built by the Atlas of Living Australia team at Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) in Australia using the open source code and biodiversity data infrastructure that they have designed and built.

The project is a partnership between the Scottish Environment Protection Agency, Scottish Natural Heritage and the National Biodiversity Network. Significant funding support for this work came from the European Commission LIFE+ funding programme which is supporting SEPA to deliver a range of partnership initiatives in Scotland to provide a trusted gateway to data and information about the environment, and involve Scotland’s citizens in discussion, monitoring and action to protect and improve the environment.

The European Commission LIFE+ funding programme is the European Union’s funding instrument for the environment, which contributes to the implementation, updating and development of EU environmental policy and legislation.