Crucial elements for assessing earthquake risk are exposure and vulnerability. In assessing earthquake risk to the Australian built environment we need to know what is exposed to earthquake ground motion and also how vulnerable the exposed infrastructure is to the severity of shaking. While central business district (CBD) buildings make up a relatively small proportion of Australia's built environment their function and the business activity they support is vital to Australia's economy. This paper describes an ongoing effort by the Australian Government to undertake engineering and architectural surveys of buildings within state capital CBDs. With funding from the Attorney-General's Department Geoscience Australia has recently completed a survey of the Melbourne CBD and will complete surveys of the Sydney, Adelaide and Brisbane CBDs this financial year. Survey teams comprise a structural engineer and a GIS operator who populates survey fields on a handheld computer. Approximately 90 survey data fields are incorporated in the template to enable capture of the variety in building features. The fields cover building characteristics that are understood to influence earthquake vulnerability. A summary of the survey activity undertaken to date is presented here along with some examples of the type of data that is being collected.

Hydrometeorological events make up or contribute to a majority of disasters in Australia and around the world. Scientists expect climate change will accelerate the frequency and intensity of these events in the future. Information on the location and characteristics of the built and social environment combined with hazard modelling and spatial analysis can facilitate the identification of buildings, people and infrastructure exposed to a particular natural hazard event. This information informs evidence based decision making and future planning to aid in the preparedness, response and recovery to severe hazard events. In Australia, the National Exposure Information System (NEXIS) is a significant national project being undertaken by Geoscience Australia (GA). In 2006 GA embarked on the development of NEXIS in response to the Council of Australian Governments (COAG) reform commitment on Australian's ability to manage natural disasters and other emergencies. The COAG commitment called for the establishment of a 'nationally consistent system of data collection, research and analysis to ensure a sound knowledge base on natural disasters and disaster mitigation' (DOTARS 2002). NEXIS database contains information on buildings, people, businesses and infrastructure and is derived from publicly available demographic, structural, economic and statistical data. Exposure profiles contain information on: building type, size, construction materials, age, replacement costs and population demographics for all residential, commercial and industrial buildings in Australia. Aggregated exposure information underpins risk assessment, emergency management, climate change adaptation, urban planning, insurance industry and research to help assist evidence based decision making. NEXIS development and operationalisation is crucial to support the decision makers and underpins community safety, emergency management and disaster risk reduction initiatives Australia This paper will discuss the development of NEXIS and its application in several national projects with the Department of Climate Change Energy and Efficiency (DCCEE) in Australia and recent national disaster impacts assessments on: Queensland tropical cyclone Yasi, Victoria bushfires and the Queensland floods.

Climate change is expected to exacerbate a range of natural hazards in Australia leading to more severe community impacts in the future. There is a need to adapt to a changing hazard environment and increasing community exposure in regions most likely influenced by climate change. Through this paper GA develops a methodology for projecting Australian communities in a spatial sense into the future. The application of this methodology is demonstrated in a case study. In order to address the fact that the impacts of climate change are expected to be more evident in the second half of this century, this model was to extend beyond the 30 year limitation of finer scale population projections, dwelling projections and development plans.

Geoscience Australia is currently undertaking the process to update the Australian National Earthquake Hazard Map using modern methods and an extended, more complete catalogue of Australian earthquakes. This map is a key component of Australia's earthquake loading code. The characterisation of strong ground-shaking using Ground-Motion Prediction Equations (GMPEs) underpins any earthquake hazard assessment. Recently there have been many advances in ground-motion modelling for active tectonic regions. However, the challenge for Australia - as it is for other stable continental regions - is that there are very few ground-motion recordings from large-magnitude earthquakes with which to develop empirically-based GMPEs. Consequently, there is a need to consider other numerical techniques to develop GMPEs in the absence of recorded data. Recently published Australian-specific GMPEs, which employ these numerical techniques, are now available and these will be integrated into Geoscience Australia's future hazard outputs. <p> This paper addresses several fundamental aspects related to ground-motion in Australia that are necessary to consider in the update of the National Earthquake Hazard Map, including: 1) a summary of recent advances in ground-motion modelling in Australia; 2) a comparison of Australian GMPEs against those commonly used in other stable continental regions; and 3) the impact of updated attenuation factors on local magnitudes in Australia. Specific regional and temporal aspects of magnitude calculation techniques across Australia and its affects on the earthquake catalogue will also be addressed. </p>

The development of climate change adaptation policies must be underpinned by a sound understanding of climate change risk. As part of the Hyogo Framework for Action, governments have agreed to incorporate climate change adaptation into the risk reduction process. This paper explores the nature of climate change risk assessment in the context of human assets and the built environment. More specifically, the paper's focus is on the role of spatial data which is fundamental to the analysis. The fundamental link in all of these examples is the National Exposure Information System (NEXIS) which has been developed as a national database of Australia's built infrastructure and associated demographic information. The first illustrations of the use of NEXIS are through post-disaster impact assessments of a recent flood and bushfire. While these specific events can not be said to be the result of climate change, flood and bushfire risks will certainly increase if rainfall or drought become more prevalent, as most climate change models indicate. The second example is from Australia's National Coastal Vulnerability Assessment which is addressing the impact of sea-level rise and increased storms on coastal communities on a national scale. This study required access to or the development of several other spatial databases covering coastal landforms, digital elevation models and tidal/storm surge. Together, these examples serve to illustrate the importance of spatial data to the assessment of climate change risk and, ultimately, to making informed, cost-effective decisions to adapt to climate change.

Short Version - shows orthographic animations only for each of 5 scenarios with a combined maximum inundation outline for 3 scenarios at end. Description: - Tropical Cyclone Alby passed close to the southwest corner of West Australia on April 4th 1978. Large waves and a storm surge generated by the northerly winds caused substantial coastal erosion along the Lower West coast particularly in the Geographe Bay area. Low-lying areas at Bunbury and Busselton were flooded, forcing the evacuation of many homes including the Bunbury Nursing Home. An approximate 1.1 m storm surge at Busselton caused the tide to peak at 2.5 m about 1 m above the highest astronomical tide. The Busselton Jetty was severely damaged. At Fremantle the surge was about 0.6 m causing a high tide of 1.8 m, about 0.5 m above the highest astronomical tide. [From BOM - http://www.bom.gov.au/weather/wa/cyclone/about/perth/alby.shtml - Retrieved 21/01/2010] This movie displays the results of a number of simulated storm surge events caused by an equivalent storm to Tropical Cyclone Alby on the current built terrain of Mandurah, and projected 2100 coastline with 0.5, 0.8 and 1.1m rises in sea level.

The impacts of climate change, including sea level rise and the increased frequency of storm surge events, will adversely affect infrastructure in a significant number of Australian coastal communities. In order to quantify this risk and develop suitable adaptation strategies, the Department of Climate Change and Energy Efficiency (DCCEE) commissioned the National Coastal Vulnerability Assessment (NCVA). With contributions from Geoscience Australia (GA) and the University of Tasmania, this first-pass national assessment has identified the extent and value of infrastructure that are potentially vulnerable to impacts of climate change. A number of fundamental national scale datasets underpinned the NCVA. A mid-resolution digital elevation model was used to model a series of sea level rise projections incorporating 1 in 100 year storm-tide estimates where available. The model outputs were overlain with a national coastal geomorphology dataset, titled the Smartline. The Smartline identified coastal landforms that are potentially unstable and may recede under the influence of rising sea level. These datasets were then overlain with Geoscience Australia's National Exposure Information System (NEXIS) to quantify the number and value of infrastructure elements (including residential and commercial buildings, roads and rail) potentially vulnerable to a range of sea-level rise and recession estimates for the year 2100.

In order to understand the effects a natural or man-made disaster could have on a community we need to know as much as we can about the people and buildings that occupy that area. This includes information about: People: how many people will be affected and where they live Buildings: the type of construction materials used, the number of storeys, and age all contribute to how a building withstands damage Cost : how much will it cost to rebuild a house or replace contents if damaged This information is used to not only investigate physical impacts of a disaster, but also forms base information that is needed to help inform the socio-economic impacts, such as loss to the business community when impacted by severe cyclonic wind storms. This information is used when calculating the risk from natural and man-made disasters in order to inform policy and operational decision makers of the impact on Australian communities. The National Exposure Information System (NEXIS) aims to capture this information to create up-to-date aggregated exposure data based upon building level for all residential, commercial and industrial building in Australia. Geoscience Australia (GA) embarked on the development of the National Exposure Information System (NEXIS) project in response to the Council of Australian Governments (COAG) reform commitment on Australia's ability to manage natural disasters and other emergencies. The COAG commitment was for the establishment of a nationally consistent system of data collection, research and analysis to ensure a sound knowledge base on natural disasters and disaster mitigation - (DOTARS 2002). NEXIS is also an important component for improving several projects of national interest within Geoscience Australia (GA). These include the Disaster Resilience Advice Information (DRAI), Climate hazards and Risk Section (CHRS) and the Vulnerability, Resilience and Mitigation (VRM) which investigate natural and man-made risks and their impacts on the community. NEXIS information is available at Local Government Are (LGA) & Statistical Area Level 2 (SA2)

Exposure refers to the elements at risk which may be subjected to the impact of severe hazards within a defined geographic area or region. These elements include the built environment, i.e buildings, infrastructure services and utilities, and also population and business activity. Geoscience Australia (GA) is developing the National Exposure Information System (NEXIS) as a national capability to provide an exposure profile to underpin analysis of natural hazards; potential disaster footprints, risk assessments and climate change adaptation research. The NEXIS capability enables modelling to gain a greater understanding of the impact and risk exposure to these events. The information is used to inform evidence based decision making and future planning to aid in the prevention, preparedness, response and recovery to severe hazard events and climate change adaptation. The current NEXIS database provides exposure profile on building type, building construction materials (roof and wall), number of floors, floor area, year built and population demographics, business activity (turnover) and employee numbers. NEXIS is a demonstrated capability used in response to Tropical Cyclone Yasi, Victoria Bushfires, Queensland Floods and other recent national disaster events. The database also provides input data for use with the Earthquake Risk Model (EQRM) and Tropical Cyclone Risk Model (TCRM) to estimate direct and indirect losses to the built environment and possible population casualities. Further development of the database is planned to incorporate infrastructure and facilities data to enhance the capability and availability of nationally consistent data and exposure information.

Geoscience Australia (GA) embarked on the development of the National Exposure Information System (NEXIS) project in response to the Council of Australian Governments (COAG) reform commitment on Australia's ability to manage natural disasters and other emergencies. The COAG commitment was for the establishment of a nationally consistent system of data collection, research and analysis to ensure a sound knowledge base on natural disasters and disaster mitigation - (DOTARS 2002). NEXIS has also been identified as an important component for improving several projects of national interest within Geoscience Australia (GA). These include the Risk Analysis Methods Section (RAMS), Climate hazards and Risk Section (CHRS) and the Vulnerability Section (VS) which investigate natural and man-made risks and their impacts on the community. The NEXIS was developed by the Exposure Information Section (EIS), National Geographic Information Group (NGIG), formerly the Engineering, Economic and Exposure Project (E3P), Risk and Impact Analysis Group (RIAG), within Geoscience Australia. It has a key role to gather accurate and up-to-date exposure information about Australia's resident population and buildings. This information is used when calculating the risk from natural and man-made disasters in order to inform policy and operational decision makers of the impact on Australian communities. In order to understand the effects a natural or man-made disaster could have on a community we need to know as much as we can about the people and buildings that occupy that area. This includes information about: People: how many people will be affected and where they live Buildings: the type of construction materials used, the number of storeys, and age all contribute to how a building withstands damage Cost : how much will it cost to rebuild a house or replace contents if damaged This information is used to not only investigate physical impacts of a disaster, but also forms base information that is needed to help inform the socio-economic impacts, such as loss to the business community when impacted by severe cyclonic wind storms. The National Exposure Information System (NEXIS) aims to maintain building level detail for all residential, commercial and industrial building in Australia. NEXIS information is available at Local Government Are (LGA) & Statistical Local Area (SLA)