ausinnovate dr rob vertessy bureau of meteorology
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TRANSCRIPT
Measuring up to improve water
management in Australia: How the
National Broadband Network can help
CeBIT Ausinnovate Conference, Sydney
Dr Rob Vertessy
24 May, 2010
“Finite, vital, much wanted but little understood, water looks unmanageable. But it needn’t be … ”
How low did we go?
Current valuesCurrent values
Lowest valuesLowest values
System Storage (% of capacity)
Why invest in water information?
Diverse data are needed to understand our water resources
Navigating the water information jungle
• Lots of players
• Fragmentation within organisations
• Lack of standard data formats
• General absence of metadata
• Poor geocoding of sites
• Immature data supply systems
• Data quality unclear
• Varied data licenses
Our new water information mandate.
• 10-year Australian Government program began July 2007
• $450m funding
– 130 new staff + systems + research and development
– Administered funding support for data providers
• Legislative backing
– Water Act 2007
– Water Regulations 2008
Our new water functions
1. Set standards for water data.
2. Collect primary information from water data holders and build a national repository.
3. Provide a range of value-added water information products and services for the nation.
4. Assist water data collecting agencies to modernise their observing systems.
5. Invest in water information research and development
Administrative boundaries•Water planning areas, councils, supply schemes, g/w areas
Place and feature names
Land cover, soils, hydrogeology
National Digital Elevation Data
Satellite and Airborne Orthoimagery
National hydrofeatures•Rivers, lakes, wetlands, reservoirs, aquifers
Catchment reporting units•Basins, catchments, sub-catchments
Water infrastructure•Supply and drainage channels, pipes, plants, storages
Monitoring points•Flow and rain gauges, water meters, climate stations, bores
All Australian public storages
> 1 GL
How the NBN can help
• A trunk for a national environmental monitoring telemetry network
• Enhances the delivery of powerful environmental information to the household
Components of the BureauComponents of the Bureau’’s Observation Systems Observation System
6753 sites @ May 201043% telemetered
Open sites - all parameters
0
10000
20000
30000
40000
50000
level or
pressure
water quality
level or flow
water quality
meteorological
storages
groundwater surface water
number of sites
with telemetry
without telemetry
49268
0.3%
19205
0.7%
6753
43%
7582
16% 3334
52% 459
48%
Bureau web site hits(Billions per month)
2.0
1.0
0.5
1.5
2.5
Forecast Explorer
