Digital innovation is a key factor in tackling many of the world’s core challenges, offering the opportunity to improve the lives of individuals and societies. In this article, I’m exploring how digital innovation is helping to create more sustainable futures for people, place and the planet.
While digital innovation is a critical enabler of positive change, it requires us to think carefully about what we spend our time pursuing and what we should avoid. All too often, it seems that people choose to allocate time, money and all sorts of other resources on things that may only provide positive experiences for a few individuals, if any. For instance, does society really want or need vertical take-off air taxis or fast food drone deliveries? Humans produce so much unnecessary waste, it’s imperative that we use our resources wisely and that means losing the ‘tech-spew’ mindset to innovation.
I love to see meaningful innovation through technology and celebrate it. In the spirit of that, this article will act as a showcase of some of those at the forefront of digital innovation for people, place and planet.
For nature
AI to address the biodiversity crisis
Conservation X Labs’ Sentinel tool has been developed to allow conservationists to respond to wildlife-related threats on the spot. Using artificial intelligence to process environmental data unique to a place, the technology can monitor invasive species, poaching and wildlife trafficking, zoonotic diseases and changing animal behaviour in real-time.
The technology is producing promising results in practice. In Costa Rica, for example, Sentinel is being used to protect endangered species such as jaguars. If the camera spots threatened species close to a poaching hotspot, rangers are sent to prevent hunting before it happens.
Tracking migratory animals
Tracking the movements of small animals and birds in flight has been a challenge for many conservationists and biologists. The Motus Wildlife Tracking System uses coordinated automated radio telemetry to allow this to be done with much greater temporal and geographic precision. Professionals do this by catching and tagging the animals with tiny lightweight transmitters that transmit data to the receiver stations – as the project has been doing recently in the Bahamas following the installation of two new stations.
To further drive global advances in ecology and innovation, Motus is looking to develop standardised technologies and data flows by 2025 and make 90% of its data open access by 2027.
Identifying manatees with AI
To better protect manatee populations under threat, engineers at the Florida Atlantic University have developed a new computer model to count manatees in shallow waters. Using deep learning, the technology can identify where manatees aggregate, what their habits are and where they go for food, meaning conservationists can improve planning, better understand habitat loss, and design rules for boaters and divers.
Having seen promising results in the first stage of the project, the next stage is to work with biologists to improve the model and make it more efficient. As the study’s lead author, Xingquan Zhu says: “With deep learning, you can just keep training it. There’s normally no end.”
Zooniverse citizen science portal
The Zooniverse citizen science portal gives people the opportunity to take part in all sorts of citizen science projects – ranging from science to humanities – and currently has almost three million registered volunteers and 50 active projects.
Of the many focused on nature and biodiversity, they include: mapping deep-sea coral in the Gulf of Mexico to restore habitats impacted by the Deepwater Horizon oil spill; identifying birds to help develop technology to recognise them automatically; identifying different blood cell types in monkeys to understand which are healthy and which may be sick.
It’s incredible to think that anyone, anywhere, no matter your background or education, can play such an important role in research.
For the environment
UN’s digital transformation for the environment
As part of the UN’s Global Environment Monitoring System for Air, it is looking for ways to accelerate digital transformation for the environment and improve air quality across the globe.
This has involved piloting innovation labs through pilot projects – largely focused on the use of low-cost sensors to improve air quality data and monitoring. The UN now plans to investigate the application of satellite surface estimates for pollution hotspots.
An additional partnership with IQAir is also exploring the potential of crowdsourcing air pollution data. The database provides an interactive map that shows real-time estimates for pollution from thousands of governments, researchers and citizens. The tool then uses the data to estimate local air pollution in each country.
Making climate change more accessible
AWEN is a data-driven mobile experience co-created by scientists, artists, designers and engineers, with the intention of making the climate crisis ‘personal’. By combining interactive art, sound, movement and play with global climate data, the project created a “climate walk”, using “prompts” to encourage users to take a different perspective on the surroundings along the way.
The project also explored the transformative potential of machine learning algorithms to tailor walks to individual locations and interests, concluding that new technologies “can make intimate, personalised experiences deploy at a truly massive scale.”
A really inspired way to encourage care and stewardship for the planet.
Digital tools for natural disasters
With flooding a major problem in Texas, and a lack of integration between technical modelling tools and social science, Texas University launched the Bridging Barriers project to improve the state’s hazard preparedness and response. By overlaying new, granular flood maps over specially designed street maps that indicate all known structures, residences and vulnerable communities, the tool is designed to enable state agencies and local governments to respond faster and allocate resources more effectively.
In addition to better understanding the compounding effects of flooding, heat, other hazards and social vulnerability in Texas, the project hopes to create a replicable framework that can be used in other locations.
For society
Community-driven innovation in developing countries
As part of a drive to improve access to digital technology to people in the developing world, a research team at Swansea University developed a new methodology to empower communities to help shape new digital technologies that meet their needs.
Through ‘itinerative’ design, the team ran workshops in communities in Kenya and India to identify challenges and opportunities, before piloting and developing prototypes. One such project in Bangalore uncovered a need for greater security so public workers and children don’t need to carry their phone out in public. This led to the development of APPropriate, an app that allows people to use others’ devices as their own.
Another project, meanwhile, has seen public space smart speakers installed in an Indian slum and a South African township, enabling citizens to ask questions and have access to information at all times.

Tech for Better Care
Technology is playing an increasingly vital role in how care and support is delivered – as outlined in the Government’s What Good Looks Like for adult care strategy. In line with this, the Health Foundation launched a new £2m programme exploring the potential for using technology to enable care at home and in the community.
10 projects are currently being piloted across the UK – from virtual spaces to combat loneliness through the creation of peer support networks, to digital technologies that can provide personalised support for people taking multiple medications. A digital matching platform and marketplace for day support is also being tested as a means to better connect patients and carers and boost recruitment.
Tackling violence against women and girls
In 2020, Unicef ran an online competition inviting young people to develop digital IT solutions to tackle the growing issue of domestic violence in Kyrgyzstan.
First place went to the ClickHelp Bot project, which won funding to help women to recognise signs of domestic abuse, as well as connect them with nearby crisis centres and psychologists. The tool works by determining a degree of danger based on questions developed with gender experts. Each time a user scores a critical number of points, the telegram bot tells them they need to seek help and provides information on where to get support.
Spring in our step
These inspiring examples showcase the wide-ranging ways that digital technologies are being used to support and safeguard people, place and planet – from natural disasters and biodiversity, to safety, health and wellbeing.
They should give us much to feel hopeful about – though there is, of course, still much work to be done and progress to be made. Hopefully, you now have a spring in your step and are revved up to make positive change through digital innovation!
Don’t waste time. Contact us now if you want to collaborate on digital solutions that benefit people, place and planet.
