Chief Editor UCL Open Environment, UCL Open: Environment

Science is a fundamental aspect of progress towards a better more sustainable world. Without it we cannot make sustainable decisions. Without those there is a danger that humanity will simply exploit the Planet’s resources – perhaps to the point where they are exhausted or to that point where the Planetary systems that support all living things effectively collapse. Open Science is key to ensuring that decision-makers and members of the public all round the world have access to the best information and evidence to use to guide their lives and decisions and help them thrive. Open Science is a broad initiative involving Citizen Science as well as good policies on data management and open access to peer reviewed scientific articles and well-curated databases. UCL Open Environment is a new way of publishing multi-disciplinary science concerned with the environment and how people live their lives in it. It uses open peer review of preprints where reviewers’ names are discoverable and where all reviews, preprints and fully published articles are discoverable through the doi system. UCL Open Environment is an open access free to read journal that has a publishing model based on very low charges and which is currently, by virtue of support from the Wellcome Trust, charge-free to publish in. UCL Open Environment is pleased to be supporting this important multidisciplinary initiative in Cultural Ecosystem Services and Biocultural Heritage. I look forward to UCL Open Environment being able to publish all appropriate documents and papers.