Mr Tim Brewer
Senior Lecturer in Resource Survey
Location: Building 53, Cranfield campus
E: t.brewer@cranfield.ac.uk
T: +44 (0)1234 750111 x2752
Natural Resources
Current activities
Mr Tim Brewer’s main research interest is land cover monitoring, a topic of increasing importance for Natural Resources management in the context of global change (climate change, population pressures and food production, security). Examples of recent and current projects include:
- BNSC/Defra GIFTSS - remote assessment of soil sealing in urban environments as co-investigator
- Foreign and Commonwealth Office - Monitoring and verification of cropping area in Afghanistan as co-investigator and work package leader
- Food and Agriculture Organisation – development of a GPS based land use monitoring tool.
His main consulting interest is capacity building via CPD for geographic information management. Recent examples include :
- leading successful bid for and delivery of a Professional Diploma course in GIS and Cartography for UAE military personnel)
- leading delivery of CPD in remote sensing techniques to Afghan personnel within FCO contract.
Other areas of recent activity include:
- water harvesting suitability analysis using GIS, developing customised GIS solutions
- mapping upland semi natural vegetation by air photo interpretation within the UK
- ground surveys in support of land cover classification
- topographic mapping using analogue and softcopy photogrammetry, GPS survey, erosion survey and risk assessment, archaeological mapping by remote sensing; and soil survey.
Clients
- British National Space Centre (BNSC)
- Department for Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA), UK Government
- Foreign and Commonwealth Office, UK Government
- Natural England
- Scottish Natural Heritage, Department of Trade and Industry (DTI), UK Government
- United Arab Emirates Technical Training Programme, UAE Government
Background
Mr Tim Brewer graduated with a geography degree and went on to study for a Masters in Land Resource Management. After six months voluntary work in Kenya, he returned to Cranfield to run the aerial photography laboratory. During this time extensive contributions were made to the Monitoring Landscape Change in the National Parks project. He gained his lectureship in 1994 and became Course Director for the BSc - Physical Geography. Subsequently, Tim is the Course Director for the postgraduate programme in Geographical Information Management and the Natural Resource Management option of the Land Management postgraduate programme. He has worked on research and consultancy projects in the UK and overseas, for example, Jordan, Tanzania, Sri Lanka, Afghanistan.
Selected publications
- Yallop, A R; Thomas, G; Thacker, J; Brewer, T R and Sannier, C (2006). The extent and intensity of management burning in the English uplands. Journal of Applied Ecology, 1138-1148.
- Wood, G A, Braganza, S, Brewer, T R, Kampouraki, M, Harris, J, Hannam, J, Burton, R and Deane, G 2006. The application of remote sensing to identify and measure changes in the area of soil prevented carrying out functions by sealing. Technical Report of the GIFTSS project BNSC/ITT/54, Defra code SP0541.
- Carrivick, J. L. and Brewer, T. R. 2004: Determination of regional glacier equilibrium line altitudes in Scandinavia. Geographiska. Annaler, 86A (1): 67-79.
- Yallop, A R; Thomas, G; Thacker, J; Brewer, T R and Sannier, C A D 2004. Feasibility of remote sensing to inform site condition monitoring assessments on Scottish terrestrial SSSIs. Final report submitted to Scottish Natural Heritage.
