Research and analysis

The economic impact on the UK of a disruption to GNSS - Executive summary

Published 18 October 2023

1. Introduction

Daily life in the UK is underpinned by signals from satellites orbiting in space. People and businesses across the entire economy rely on infrastructure called Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS), often called ‘satellite navigation’, to determine their position, velocity, and time. Many critical sectors depend on GNSS, in many cases without their explicit knowledge. This reliance has developed over decades, based on assumed availability and continuity of GNSS signals.

This reliance comes with its own drawbacks as it slides towards over-reliance. Given the substantial use of GNSS in the UK, and the vulnerability of the systems to failure, it is important to understand the impact on the UK to a disruption of GNSS functionality.

This question was first explored by London Economics in a June 2017 report, “The economic impact to the UK of a disruption of GNSS”, commissioned by InnovateUK with the UK Space Agency and the Royal Institute of Navigation (RIN). This new report was written in 2021 and improves the accuracy and scale of GNSS benefits and estimated losses for seven priority sectors: Agriculture, Aviation, Emergency Services, Finance, Maritime, Rail, and Road, as well as providing a more general update of all other sectors covered in the previous study.

2. Key findings

2.1 GNSS: use, benefits, and losses

The economic benefits to the UK from the use of GNSS have been monetised at £13,622m per annum. Benefits are estimated against a counterfactual scenario in which GNSS had not been developed or chosen as the primary source of PNT in the applications covered by this study.

[Figure 1]

Most of the economic benefits are estimated to come from Emergency Services (43%) and Road (42%) (Figure 1). The Emergency Services sector benefits from efficiency gains due to improved navigation and general resource management, which translate into cost savings and improved health outcomes for UK citizens. The road sector benefits from efficiency gains due to GNSS in the form of time and fuel savings, and the associated environmental benefits.

Overall, compared to the 2017 iteration of this report, the total economic benefits have increased by 102%, more than doubling in magnitude. A majority of this change is due to increases in the Emergency Services and Road sectors. In each sector an increase in device penetration (smartphones, satnavs, and insurance telematics devices) explain much of the growth.

The economic loss due to a GNSS outage for 7-days has been estimated at £7,644m. Applications in emergency services, maritime, and road together account for 87.6% of the total economic loss.

[Figure 2]

A decomposition of the drivers of the difference between the total loss figure of £7,6445m and the £5,153.5m reported in the June 2017 iteration of this report is presented in Figure 3 on the next page.

Applying a simple upscale of 40% (i.e. to reflect the two day increase in the RWCS) allows for some naïve comparison between the 2017 and 2021 loss estimates and increases the economic loss by £2,061.4m. Note that economic losses are considered against a baseline where GNSS is fully functional; mitigating efforts through ‘traditional’ means (e.g. by using paper maps) will be considered but may be limited owing to the immediacy and brevity of the disruption. These losses may diverge from monetised benefits of an application as they are measured against a different baseline to the marginal improvement considered when monetising benefits.

New applications identified and monetised in this report (scope drivers) increase the economic loss by £10.0m. The change in GNSS penetration and volume of users (use drivers) further increases the economic loss by £1,173.9m. The parameters which are used to monetise impacts have also increased (valuation), increasing the economic loss by £398.6m. Improvement in holdover and resilience since 2017 (mitigation) reduces the economic impact of GNSS loss, decreasing the economic loss by £1,171.1m. All these drivers of change combined bring the figure of £5,153.5m in the 2017 report to the figure of £7,625.3m in the 2021 report.

[Figure 3]

A separate analysis of the impact of a similar UK-wide, instantaneous outage that instead only lasts for 24 hours finds an estimated loss of £1,424m. Most of these losses are found in Emergency Services and Road transportation, each of which face severe reductions in efficiency, often with dire consequences.

In the case where holdover capacity exists, users would not notice the outage. We therefore expect either no effect over 24 hours, for those applications with sufficient holdover, or a similar but more short-term outcome as with the 7-day outages considered previously.

Details of the key findings for each sector are provided below.

Agriculture

GNSS plays a key role in modern agricultural practices in the UK, principally through applications related to cultivation, including precision farming and variable rate application (VRA). GNSS is a key driver of increasing yields on UK farms and reductions in the cost of inputs and associated environmental impact.

GNSS users in agriculture generally rely on more sophisticated equipment than many other user groups. GNSS devices for agriculture are more expensive than for other sectors, and track more signals and constellations as standard. Many include EGNOS Open Service and commercial augmentation services such as Real Time Kinematic (RTK) or Precise Point Positioning (PPP) for improved accuracy. The economic losses from a 7-day outage of GNSS in agriculture is due to less efficient cultivation practices, including increases in pass-to-pass overlap and the cost of inputs (seed, pesticide, fuel, fertilizer, etc.). This results in lower yields, which also translate into reduced GVA for the UK food processing industries which rely on agricultural inputs.

Table 1 – Agriculture applications

Application	Economic benefit (annual, £m)	Economic loss (7-day, £m)
Cultivation	524.4 (+84.4%)	223.6 (+43.5%)
Total	524.4 (+84.4%)	223.6 (+43.5%)

Note: (+%) indicates the variation in economic benefits and loss since the 2017 iteration of this report.

Source: London Economics analysis

Aviation

GNSS is increasingly being utilised within the aviation sector to optimise routing of flights, but also to improve the efficiency of the agricultural sector. Live and efficient monitoring of crops using drones benefits farmers who can respond in real time to crop and soil needs. Furthermore, in aircraft surveillance, GNSS-dependent systems optimise the distance between aircraft in flight corridors, improving efficiency of the high volumes of air traffic passing through UK airspace and beyond. Manned aircraft have a number of backup technologies that provide robust redundancies in the case of GNSS outages, explaining why a 7-day GNSS outage is associated with negligible levels of economic loss in this application, although some productivity losses are felt across the sector.

Table 2 – Aviation applications

Application	Economic benefit (annual, £m)	Economic loss (7-day, £m)
Navigation	5.0 (+266%)	0.1 (+900%)
Surveillance (communications)	21.2	0.4
Safety	3.1 (+55%)	0.5 (+56%)
Environmental	0.3	Not assessed
Productivity	158.5	3.0
Total	187.9 (+5,509%)	4.0 (+1,190%)

Note: (+%) indicates the variation in economic benefits and loss since the 2017 iteration of this report.

Source: London Economics analysis

Emergency services

Emergency Services utilise GNSS at multiple stages of their operations. Emergency phone calls are located, on-the-ground resources are tracked, and responders are directed using GNSS as a crucial input. A disruption of GNSS service would mean these emergency services, including the Police, Ambulance, Fire Brigade and Coast Guard, would not be able to properly handle demand, emergency-related calls would be longer, congestion would be severe, and navigation systems for service fleets would not function. The cost of this loss of efficiency is measured in the extra staff required to cover the deficit, and in increased response times. Emergency Services’ internal communication methods are also supported by GNSS time synchronisation functionality. Finally, there is a growing market for security and surveillance robotics, which are highly dependent on precise location information. London Economics The economic impact on the UK of a disruption to GNSS 5

Executive Summary

Table 3 Emergency Services Applications

Application	Economic benefit (annual, £m)	Economic loss (7-day, £m)
Public-safety Answer Point (PSAP) caller location	5,433.0 (+183%)	1,560.2m (+207%)
Automatic vehicle and personnel location	110.4 (+14%)	1,968.7 (+92%)
Medical delivery and critical supplies	256.0	4.9
Security and surveillance robots	5.7	0.1
Total	5,805.1 (+187%)	3,533.9 (+131%)

Note: (+%) indicates the variation in economic benefits and loss since the 2017 iteration of this report.

Source: London Economics analysis

Finance

The financial sector requires timestamping of transactions to ensure the prevailing price at the time of the transaction is charged. This is true of both stock exchanges and financial trading centres in banks. The European MiFID II regulation1 defines accuracies of timing with respect to UTC that are required for an entity to be allowed to continue operating. The equipment used by high-frequency traders has sophisticated oscillators for holdover, ensuring that trade can continue long after an external timing source is lost. Similar equipment is present in stock exchanges, meaning there would be no economic loss experienced during a 7-day GNSS outage.

Table 4 Finance applications

Application	Economic benefit (annual, £m)	Economic loss (7-day, £m)
Infrastructure (atomic clocks)	0.3 (+200%)	-
Infrastructure (conditioning)	1.4 (+180%)	-
Total	1.7 (+183%)	-

Rail

A wide array of core functions in the UK rail network rely on knowledge of train position to manage operations safely and efficiently. GNSS is widely utilised to support positioning, navigation, and timing-dependent applications that create increased safety for passengers and workers, financial and environmental efficiencies for operators, and heightened security for commercial users. A loss of GNSS results in efficiency losses and delays to trains as automatic door systems and other systems fail, resulting in lost leisure and business time for passengers.

Table 5 Rail applications

Application	Economic benefit (annual, £m)	Economic loss (7-day, £m)
Driver Advisory Systems	2.9 (-73%)	0.1 (-62%)
Fleet Management	1.7 (+1,419%)	0.0
Cargo Monitoring	0.1	0.0
Infrastructure Monitoring	14.8	0.9
Automatic Selective Door Operation	Not assessed	38.7 (+94%)
Train Cancellations	Not assessed	100.1 (+11%)
Total	19.5 (+79%)	139.9 (+27%)

Note: Values of “0.0” represent non-zero quantities that are less than 50,000. (+%) and (-%) indicate the variation in economic benefits and loss since the 2017 iteration of this report.

Source: London Economics analysis

Maritime

The maritime sector is one of the most GNSS-dependent sectors of the UK economy. Position, Navigation, and Timing (PNT) data are used at all stages of maritime journeys for navigation and safety purposes, from oceanic and coastal navigation to manoeuvres in ports. On the shore, GNSS is used to manage cargo (handling and customs operations) and keep track of vessels.

GNSS is the principal source of PNT for ships and most vessels include several GNSS-integrated systems. These include Automatic Identification Systems (AIS) used to locate ships at sea, radar, and gyrocompasses. Ports and logistics operations heavily rely on GNSS that enables the efficiencies that allow UK retailers and manufacturers to operate with limited warehousing facilities using ‘just-in-time’ and saving costs. The losses associated with a 7-day outage of GNSS in the maritime sector are quite large as automatic cranes shutdown with no alternative or mitigation. This slows down the loading and unloading of containers, leading to delays, lost trade, and disruption to supply-chains that rely on maritime-enabled logistics.

Table 6 Maritime applications

Application	Economic benefit (annual, £m)	Economic loss (7-day, £m)
Shipping industry	450.9 (+30%)	182.8 (+272%)
Port operations	Not monetised	1,309.2 (+29%)
Fishing industry	98.7 (+27%)	7.9 (+104%)
Preventing fatalities – SAR	18.1 (+104%)	0.3 (+186%)
Total	567.8 (+31%)	1,500.2 (+41%)

Note: (+%) indicates the variation in economic benefits and loss since the 2017 iteration of this report.

Source: London Economics analysis

Road

GNSS is used on roads extensively for its positioning and navigation information. Drivers use GNSS for turn-by-turn navigation. Logistics and fleet management companies use it to keep track of the location and use of their vehicles. Insurance companies use it to obtain information on their clients’ driving behaviour that would be otherwise difficult. Emergency and breakdown call use it to locate incidents and send help quickly. The reliance on GNSS means a 7-day outage would reduce navigation efficiencies for motorists and fleet operators, slowing traffic and increasing journey times. This effect would be felt by all motorists, whether reliant on GNSS or not.

Table 7 Road applications

Application	Economic benefit (annual, £m)	Economic loss (7-day, £m)
Road navigation	3,956.4 (+26.1%)	1,599.4 (-15.6%)2
Logistics and fleet management	375.5 (+143.5%)	60.2 (+148.8%)
Insurance telematics	1323.8 (+8122.4%)	Not estimated
Emergency and breakdown call	18.6 (+24.0%)	0.4
Total	5,674.3 (+70.8%)	1,659.9 (-13.6%)

Note: (+%) and (-%) indicate the variation in economic benefits and loss since the 2017 iteration of this report.

Source: London Economics analysis

Other sectors

This report primarily focuses on seven priority sectors of the UK economy. There are ten remaining sectors for which economic loss was estimated as a result of a five-day outage of GNSS in the 2017 iteration of this report3. Sectors that were deemed to be resilient to a five-day outage, and which were not prioritised for this report, are assumed to be resilient to a seven-day outage and are therefore not analysed in detail.4

Table 8 Other sectors

Sector	Economic benefit (annual, £m)	Economic loss (7-day, £m)
Offender Tracking	31.5 (+2.3%)	0.6 (+50.0%)
Satellite Communications	32.4 (+2.2%)	32.2 (+42.5%)
Surveying	127.5 (+97.8%)	526.5 (+52.7%)
Location-Based Services (LBS)	209.8 (+2.4%)	1.6 (+100.0%)
Energy	4.5 (+2.3%)	Not monetised
Fixed line communications	32.8 (+2.5%)	-
Cellular telecommunications	5.1 (+2.0%)	-
TETRA	4.6 (+2.3%)	Unknown
Meteorology	102.0 (+2.0%)	2.1 (+40.0%)
Health	291.3 (+17.6%)	1.0 (+42.9%)
Total	841.5 (+24.7%)	583.0 (+50.3%)

Note: (+%) indicates the variation in economic benefits and loss since the 2017 iteration of this report.

Source: London Economics analysis

2.2 Less-than Worst Case Scenarios

The GNSS Loss estimates that are the focus of this study assume a Reasonable Worst-Case Scenario (RWCS) of 7 days of GNSS outage. Such a scenario is justified by National Security Risk Assessment methods. In reality, more plausible sources of disruptions are likely to be more limited in both scope and duration than this RWCS. This motivates consideration of the economic losses associated with a more likely ‘Less than Worst-Case Scenario (LWCS).

To illustrate more likely scenarios of disruption, two case studies of less than worst case scenario events were proposed by LE and agreed by the UK Space Agency. These were chosen to demonstrate the potential high impact associated with disruption to economically important areas:

• LWCS 1: jamming event around the Port of Dover;

• LWCS 2: a spoofing event (i.e. provision of fake GNSS-like signals) around the Heathrow area, between Junction 14 and Junction 15 on the M25 (affecting the flight path into Heathrow and the widest part of the M25, so presumably the busiest).

In LWCS 1, it emerges that the port has two main points of vulnerabilities; the road and port entrances. While experienced drivers and employees with local knowledge would not be directly impacted by the jamming of their devices, tourists might respond to the blackout by reducing their speed, triggering traffic jam events. Economic loss would result due to the late arrival of lorries and reduced efficiency due to less available staff. On the seaside, delays may occur as ferries would reduce their speed, having to rely on alternative instruments and line of sight for port approach navigation. Given the intensity of road haulage and passenger traffic at Dover, any delays and cancellation would cause lorries to stack up at the port. Dover handles on average £334m worth of commodities per day and a single 24-hour outage could result in an amount up to this entire value lost to the UK economy as over 850 lorries accumulate in a queue over 10km long and almost 4,000 would-be passengers are stuck at the port until the backlog is cleared.

In LWCS 2, we find that a spoofing event between Junction 14 and Junction 15 on the M25 is highly likely to cause noticeable disruptions to motor vehicle traffic passing these junctions. Shortly afterwards flights operations would be affected. As flight crews and passengers are held up by the traffic, some flights may not take off and some passengers may miss their flights. However, inbound flights are unlikely to be affected as landing procedures at Heathrow do not use GNSS. The total economic cost from this spoofing event is estimated at £1.28m.

2.3 Mitigation technologies and strategies

Prior to the wider adoption of GNSS devices, navigation relied on the use of clocks and sextants, or radar systems to determine position at sea, and the use of paper maps on the road. Reverting to these methods could be a solution in the absence of signal but there are multiple reasons to believe this will not be as efficient. There is currently no universally applicable alternative to GNSS for the case of positioning and navigation, and many of the traditional means of navigation might not be readily available or useable by users as the capabilities and equipment to use these alternatives have been degraded or lost.

A range of modern options are either currently available or under development, and the development of a resilient PNT infrastructure that employs the appropriate mitigation technology could contribute to reducing the total economic loss during a 7-day outage by almost 50%.

2.4 Possible causes of loss of GNSS

Though the focus of this report’s hypothetical Reasonable Worst-Case Scenario is a GNSS outage, there are numerous real-world examples of such outages with varying causes and impacts due to existing GNSS vulnerabilities. Three main categories of threat to GNSS availability and performance exist: receiver vulnerabilities, environmental challenges, and human interaction issues.

Receiver vulnerabilities involve intentional or accidental targeting of GNSS receivers. These incidents are split into three broad categories.

• Jamming events entail intentional ‘blinding’ of receiver antenna with noise. Adaptive notch filters can be incorporated into receivers5 to mitigate these attacks, and more sophisticated methods are being developed.6

• Spoofing, the transmission of false GNSS-like signals, attempts to convince GNSS receivers that they are in a different location. Possible countermeasures include encryption mechanisms which restrict access to the GNSS signal itself and authentication of the navigation message.

• Meaconing is the term given to ‘replay attacks’, the rebroadcasting of genuine GNSS signals. The use of multiple receivers to detect and remove the effects of meaconing has been explored.7

Environmental challenges include the many technical challenges that the user environment can produce for GNSS devices.

• Space weather describes the varying levels of electromagnetic radiation naturally emitted by the sun which impact GNSS signals’ passage through the ionosphere and magnetosphere. Advance warning of a major events could inform users of heightened risk of disruption, giving time to seek alternative Position, Navigation, and Timing sources.

• Space debris refers to the growing population of orbital debris generated by human space activity. Efforts are underway to track, inform, and assist manoeuvres to avoid collisions.8

• Geographical constraints, or multipath, designate issues related to mountainous terrain or urban environments that obscure satellites from view. Some mitigation is offered by receivers that are designed to be capable of receiving signals from multiple constellations9.

• Near-channel radio interference refers to the unintentional interference of other systems that use the same frequency bands as GNSS, which can degrade GNSS performance. Careful spectrum allocation and frequency management remains essential to minimise risk.

Human interaction issues are the vulnerabilities caused by direct interaction with the GNSS system by users and operators.

• Ground station anomalies can occur due to human error in uploads to GNSS satellites, or other improper interaction with the GNSS system. Proper training and careful design of safeguards can mitigate some of these vulnerabilities.

• Internal inconsistencies in the system can produce errors that render GNSS unusable. These are generally rooted in design flaws or unanticipated events. Ensuring the firmware of the receiver is up-to-date is the most important user action for mitigation.

• Infrastructure failure is an umbrella term that covers the various potential causes of GNSS constellations becoming unavailable for users, such as ceasing of operations due to technological upgrades or space warfare. As dependency on GNSS grows so too does this vulnerability.

2.5 Caveats and limitations

The research has been conducted by a team of independent professional economists with specialist knowledge of GNSS technology and markets, using best practice and best judgement. The methodology used and assumptions made are described in a transparent manner, with caveats clearly noted. Nonetheless, the reader should note following caveats and limitations of the study:

• This report portrays information based on codified publicly available information, our own knowledge of downstream GNSS applications, and information gathered through interviews with more than 20 stakeholders in a wide range of domains.

• Though this report does point to potential sources of a disruption (in order to communicate the vulnerability of GNSS, and the real risk of a disruption), the report is agnostic to the actual source of the considered disruption.

• The disruption to GNSS is considered as a standalone event – pre-existing redundancy systems are assumed to operate as planned.

• This study considers evidence of use, holdover capacity, and resilience that was available during the study period – i.e. from March 2021.

• The latest available data to calculate losses and benefits for this study is the 2020/2021 financial year. However, this study considers benefits and losses calculations based on 2019 economic data. This is because 2020/2021 are abnormal years by any standard because of the disruptions posed by Brexit implementation and the Covid-19 pandemic. It is important to note that despite best efforts, GNSS applications are dynamic and reliance changes over time. The results may therefore have short shelf-life.