Which nations are covered?

All four UK nations. Sites come from four national registers, maintained by Natural England in England, NatureScot in Scotland, Natural Resources Wales in Wales and DAERA NIEA in Northern Ireland.

What is the statutory basis?

England and Wales designate under the Conservation of Habitats and Species Regulations 2017. Scotland uses the Conservation (Natural Habitats &c.) Regulations 1994, and Northern Ireland the Conservation (Natural Habitats etc.) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 1995. We record the relevant basis per site rather than flattening the nations together.

Are candidate SACs included?

Yes. Candidate SACs are folded into the dataset and flagged through a status field, so you can separate fully designated sites from those still progressing through designation.

Everything is Open Government Licence v3.0, sourced from named public-sector custodians, with per-custodian attribution returned on every record. The product is an annual licence rather than pay-per-call, and the /types vocabulary endpoint is free to evaluate.

What coordinate system is used?

Every centroid is valid EPSG:4326 (WGS84), reprojected server-side from each source's native CRS: British National Grid 27700 in Great Britain and Irish Grid 29902 in Northern Ireland.

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Conservation & Nature

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Special Areas of Conservation (SAC)

Every UK Special Area of Conservation, from Natural England, NatureScot, Natural Resources Wales and DAERA NIEA, in one schema with mappable EPSG:4326 geometry.

~666

SACs covered

Nations

EPSG:4326

Geometry

OGL v3.0

Licence

Overview

About this dataset

A Special Area of Conservation (SAC) protects habitats and species of European importance. SACs form the UK's national site network, the successor to Natura 2000, and are among the strongest statutory nature protections that bear on planning and licensing decisions.

The legal basis differs by nation, and we keep that distinction intact. England and Wales designate under the Conservation of Habitats and Species Regulations 2017. Scotland designates under the Conservation (Natural Habitats &c.) Regulations 1994. Northern Ireland designates under the Conservation (Natural Habitats etc.) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 1995. The named custodians are Natural England (around 260 sites), NatureScot (around 253), Natural Resources Wales (around 95) and DAERA NIEA (58 terrestrial sites).

We reconcile those four national registers into one schema with one stable identifier per site. Candidate SACs are folded in and flagged through a status field, so you can tell a fully designated site from one still in the designation process. Every geometry is reprojected server-side to EPSG:4326 (WGS84) from its native British National Grid or Irish Grid origin, and every record carries Open Government Licence v3.0 provenance with per-custodian attribution.

Query the data read-only over REST at /v1/conservation by point, radius, bounding box or polygon, or fetch a single site by its stable id. SAC records share the schema and identity model used across our heritage and conservation designations, so one point query can return SACs alongside listed buildings, scheduled monuments and other constraints on the same land.

What's included

Everything in the box

Four registers, one schema

Natural England, NatureScot, Natural Resources Wales and DAERA NIEA sites reconciled into a single record shape with one stable identifier per SAC.

Spatial query in four shapes

Find SACs by point, radius, bounding box or polygon, or fetch one site directly by its stable id.

Candidate sites flagged

Candidate SACs are folded in and marked through a status field, so designated sites are kept distinct from those still in process.

EPSG:4326 geometry

Every centroid is reprojected server-side to WGS84 from British National Grid or Irish Grid, ready to map without further transformation.

Clean OGL provenance

Open Government Licence v3.0 throughout, with per-custodian attribution returned on every record for clean commercial reuse.

Welsh bilingual names

Welsh site names are served in name_cy where the custodian publishes one, alongside the English name.

Data fields

What each record carries

schema14 fields

reference: string// Custodian site code that identifies the SAC within its national register.

nation: enum// Nation code for the register the site belongs to: ENG, SCT, WAL or NIR.

source: string// The public-sector custodian that designates and maintains the site.

name: string// Official site name as published by the custodian.

name_cy: string// Welsh-language site name where the custodian publishes one, otherwise null.

designation_type: enum// Designation class. Always special_area_of_conservation for this product.

status: enum// Designation status: designated for a fully classified SAC, candidate for a cSAC still in process.

designated_date: date// Date the site was designated, subject to date_precision.

amended_date: date// Date of the most recent boundary or status amendment, where recorded.

date_precision: enum// Precision of the served dates: day, month, year or none.

local_authority: string// Local authority area the site centroid falls within.

area_hectares: float// Designated site area in hectares as published by the custodian.

centroid: object// Representative point in EPSG:4326 (WGS84) with lat and lng.

attribution: string// Per-custodian attribution string to display with the record.

Sample response

Straight from the API

response.jsonapplication/json

{
  "id": "design.conservation.ENG.special_area_of_conservation.UK0012720",
  "reference": "UK0012720",
  "nation": "ENG",
  "source": "Natural England",
  "name": "Epping Forest",
  "name_cy": null,
  "designation_type": "special_area_of_conservation",
  "status": "designated",
  "designated_date": "2005-04-01",
  "amended_date": null,
  "date_precision": "day",
  "category": "national_site_network",
  "local_authority": "Epping Forest",
  "area_hectares": 1728.18,
  "source_url": "https://designatedsites.naturalengland.org.uk/SiteDetail.aspx?SiteCode=UK0012720",
  "centroid": {
    "lat": 51.6505,
    "lng": 0.0451
  },
  "licence": "OGL-UK-3.0",
  "attribution": "Contains Natural England data, licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0"
}

Use cases

What people build with it

Development site due diligence

Screen a site or land parcel against SAC boundaries before acquisition, so habitat constraints and the need for a Habitats Regulations Assessment surface early.

Developers

Planning constraint checks

Run a point or polygon query to confirm whether a proposal falls within or near an SAC, where competent-authority assessment duties apply.

Planners

Lending and valuation risk

Flag SAC overlap on a security property where development potential or remediation could be constrained by habitat protection.

Lenders

Environmental underwriting

Add SAC proximity to underwriting models where designated habitats raise liability, remediation or reputational exposure.

Insurers

Biodiversity and ESG screening

Screen portfolios against protected nature sites for biodiversity net gain reporting and ESG nature-risk disclosure.

Investors