News Archive

A summary of the speakers talks and the subsequent discussion fromThe UWA Oceans Institute Coastal and Oceans Institute Forum follows. A link to the lectopia recording of the evenings proceedings  can be found at:

https://lectopia.uwa.edu.au/lectopia/staff/recordingedit.lasso?RecordingID=136686

Environmental Protection Authority (DEC): Research requirements and trends: Dr. Paul Vogel (Chair)

The Office of the Environmental Protection Authority provides advice to Government, develops policy, considers environmental impact assessments and ensures compliance through auditing, including for the marine environment.

To gauge an environmental impact assessment, sound knowledge of the biota and their possible response to different pressures exerted during development is required. Effectively, the Authority is relying on the ability to predict impacts and these predictions require good science behind them to ensure adequate confidence in the predictions.

The marine environment can be affected by:

• Industrial and urban development: power and water

• Port development: dredging, piling and filling

• Shipping: accidents and introduced marine pests

Areas of uncertainty that were identified:

• Dredging, particularly particle transport and ecological impact modelling;

• Biota distribution and composition, principally the importance of their ecological roles and critical habitats;

• Response to development pressures, the cause and effect pathways and indicators of stress;

• A measure of susceptibility or resilience of ecosystems to different development pressures;

• The recovery potential of ecosystems; and .

• Seasonal variability.

The science needs to be high quality, relevant, fit for purpose and outcome focussed.

WA Planning Commission: Research requirements and trends: Gary Prattley (Chair)

A core consideration of The WA Planning Commission is vulnerability or risk. To improve management it requires information on:

• How the coastline is changing, at what rate and how will this be impacted by climate change and with infrastructure installation;

• Regional and local coastal sediment budgets;

• The coastal (inshore) wave regime for developed and high growth areas;

• Increased monitoring of sea level and storm surge through an expanded network of tidal stations; and

• Understanding of shallow (within 30m isobath) water habits to identify areas of significant bio-productivity for protection and determine the contribution of biota to coastal sediment budgets.

Research should be focussed on WA coastal processes, building the information database, developing predictive models and running them.

Australian Petroleum Production and Exploration Association Limited (APPEA): Research requirements and trends for the oil and gas industry: Tom Baddeley (WA Director)

This association represents the oil and gas industry and is focused on safety and reducing its environmental footprint. Strategic thought focuses on:

1. Dredging research: Understanding the relationship between dredging, water quality and the health of benthic communities needs -

• Better predictive models to determine impacts on benthic primary producers such as corals.

• Monitoring of marine eco-systems with greater precision and using diver-less technologies.

2. Invasive marine species: manage and mitigate the threat of invasive species through management practices.

3. EPBC Act: Minimise impact on environment, especially large mammals and reptiles. Good knowledge required of seasonality of critical behaviors through new technologies such as baited cameras and satellite tagging.

4. Worse case scenario management: multiple aspects need to be addressed to develop Environmental Emergency Plans.

5. Strategic approaches to land-use planning and environmental assessment.

6. Data management for good of all community.

Question time focus

The areas addressed during question time were:

• Risk analysis as related to spills – local expertise needs to be developed for immediate response.
• Data management from environmental assessments needs to be collated. Data provided to EPA needs to be the raw data rather than summaries, recognizing there are IP and commercial sensitivities.
• Risk communication and perception by the community need to be improved.
• A research centre in the North of Western Australia was suggested but others acknowledged the difficulties in creating critical mass in a remote area.
• Research more than the sum of parts and this will be managed by addressing key issues across all disciplines (including social sciences) within the University and with key national and international partners.

For further information please contact Maryann Evetts on (08) 6488 8116 or email: [email protected]