CEO's Update
Recently the Australian Government announced Australia’s 2022 Critical Minerals Strategy, aiming to make Australia a critical minerals powerhouse by 2030, capitalising on the strength of its world-leading resources sector, expertise in processing, and highly skilled workforce. Image: Australian Government
So it is 2022, and there is a lot going on! Opportunity is in the air.
This year, a federal election brings many opportunities for significant government commitments to geoscience. There have been announcements relating to the University Research Commercialisation Action Plan ($2.2 billion), Australia’s Critical Minerals Strategy 2022 ($250 million), and Antarctica infrastructure investment ($800 million).
We see enormous opportunities for the AuScope community and our suite of research infrastructures to collaborate across these new initiatives through our growing geophysical deployments in Antarctica and our AuScope Geochemistry Network (AGN), Simulation, Analysis and Modelling (SAM), National Virtual Core Library (NVCL) and AuScope Virtual Research Environment (AVRE) programs. These new opportunities will also enhance our current industry collaborations and strengthen these relationships based on the growing need for critical mineral security.
The 2021 National Research Infrastructure Roadmap is about to be released. With it comes the opportunity to provide sustainable new investment in research infrastructures of all types and for AuScope to continue to build the Downward Looking Telescope (DLT) for the Australian geoscience research community.
AuScope’s DLT is the Australian geoscience research community’s vision for a futureproof research infrastructure system to support Australia’s sustainable future. Learn more. Image: AuScope
The coming 5-year investment cycle allows us to review the impact of our existing programs and pilots and identify opportunities for growth in areas of geoscience research that we have not traditionally supported.
The creation of the new Director of Research Data Systems role and the appointment of Dr Rebecca Farrington provides AuScope with the opportunity to realise our strategic goal of being a leader in the delivery of FAIR geoscience data nationally and internationally. We also have the chance to build a more collaborative community of practice around our handling of geoscience datasets and the related challenges.
Dr Rebecca Farrington joins us as Director of Research Data Systems. Meet Rebecca and discover her vision for transforming AuScope’s research data capability. Image: Meredith Jones
Similarly, the appointment of Dr Cam McCuiag to the AuScope Board provides an enormous opportunity for us to refine and develop our industry engagement ensuring that AuScope research infrastructures and data systems not only support research activities within university laboratories but also within the Australian exploration geoscience industry.
Finally, the signing of a significant new MoU with the European Plate Observing System (EPOS) provides an excellent opportunity for creating new connections, communities and international collaborations across all of our programs.
With so much potential, we have a lot of work to do as a community to realise as many of these opportunities as possible. As always, we at AuScope are ready to lead this activity. We are very keen to engage with you all to support the Australian geoscience community in any way we can. We look forward to the journey.
Warm regards, Tim Rawling
IDEAS?
Please reach out if you would like to know more about AuScope, if you have ideas to share, or want to collaborate.