Australia's mineral resources have been sustained at adequate levels, relative to production, through continued exploration at known deposits and successful exploration in greenfield regions. At a number of mines, resources have increased progressively despite mining over an extended period. Increased efficiencies in mining and processing, achieved through application of new technology, have resulted in higher recoveries of minerals from many deposits.

Australia's Identified Mineral Resources is an annual nation-wide assessment of Australia's ore reserves and mineral resources.

Australia's Identified Mineral Resources is an annual nation-wide assessment of Australia's ore reserves and mineral resources.

Australia's near-pristine estuaries are some of our most valuable natural assets, with many natural and cultural heritage values. They are important as undisturbed habitat for native plants and animals, for biodiversity conservation, as Indigenous lands and for tourism. They also support near-shore fisheries. In addition, by studying near-pristine estuaries, scientists can learn more about the way humans have changed natural systems. This information then feeds into natural resource management because it constitutes benchmark or baseline information against which similar information from more modified estuaries can be compared.

The map shows in situ coal resoruces. The resources of brown and black coal depsits are totalled and assigned to basins/regions which host these deposits.

Coastal lagoons are a type of estuary, which has highly variable assemblages of primary producer groups. A classification is derived distinguishing microphytobenthos-dominated, perennial and ephemeral submerged aquatic vegetation-dominated, and nutrient- and light-limited phytoplankton-dominated lagoons. The principle variables required for the classification are bathymetry, light attenuation and initial solar radiation, dissolved inorganic nitrogen concentration and the area covered by ephemeral and perennial submerged aquatic vegetation. Biogeochemical processes and system-wide nutrient dynamics are inherently coupled to the distribution of primary producer groups, so that the classification provides inferences on water quality and ecosystem functioning for different lagoon types and supports the development of management plans and ecological status assessments. Four case studies representing different lagoon types from the temperate south-eastern and south-western coast of Australia are presented. It is demonstrated that the distribution of primary producer groups, and consequently the lagoon type, can be temporarily variable, e.g. as a function of seasonal solar radiation and light attenuation, the water level in a closed lagoon or the degree of eutrophication.

to come

This special issue of Continental Shelf Research presents 13 research papers that contain the latest results in the field of benthic marine environment mapping and seabed characterisation. A total of 10 papers in this special issue were presented as papers and posters at GeoHab conferences in 2007 (Noumea, New Caledonia), 2008 (Sitka, Alaska) and 2009 (Trondheim, Norway). The annual GeoHab conference provides a forum in which marine physical and biological scientists, managers, policy makers, and industry representatives can convene to engage in discussions regarding mapping and characterising the seabed. The papers contained in this special issue build on the work published in Greene and Todd (2005): Mapping the Seafloor for Habitat Characterization, a special publication of the Geological Association of Canada.

This short video summarises the value of Geoscience Australia's work to the discovery, development and export of Australia's mineral and energy commodities. The video is from a series of six films produced to communicate Geoscience Australia's value to the nation. Further information about the agency's work in this area can be found at http://www.ga.gov.au/value-to-the-nation

From 1995 to 2000 information from the federal and state governments was compiled for Comprehensive Regional Assessments (CRA), which formed the basis for Regional Forest Agreements (RFA) that identified areas for conservation to meet targets agreed by the Commonwealth Government with the United Nations. These 3 CDs were created as part of GA's contribution to the Eden, NSW CRA. CD1 contains original and final versions of all data coverages and shapefiles used in the project, Published Graphics files in ArcInfo (.gra), postscript (.ps) and Web ready (.gif) formats, all Geophysical Images and Landsat data and final versions of documents provided for publishing. CD2 contains the DEFUNCT directories, data that has been modified or replaced in the final version. CD3 contains the INTEGRTN directory, integration data used for evaluating options.