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  • Fugitive methane emissions, in particular relating to coal seam gas (CSG),has become an emerging issue in Australia over the last few years. There has been significant controversy in US regarding the magnitude of fugitive emissions during production from unconventional gas wells, with large differences in emissions reported between studies using different measurement approaches. . Preliminary research into a small number of Australia's unconventional fields suggest the average fugitive emissions per well are lower than that found in the US. The primary challenge is that the techniques for quantifying methane leakages are still at an early stage of development. Current methods for the small to medium scale use chamber based approaches or vehicles installed with fixed sampling lines and high precisions gas analysers. These technologies are promising, but generally have not been ground truthed in field conditions against known emission rates to estimate effectiveness. They also have limited application in environments where vehicle access is not possible. The Ginniderra facility is being upgraded to support a methane controlled release experiment in 2015. This will enable testing of and verifying methods and technologies for measuring and quantifying methane emissions. To address the absence of suitable techniques for emmission measurement at medium scales, several BOREAL lasers will be deployed which work at scales of 20-1000 m. It is also envisaged airborne techniques utilising laser and hyperspectral will be deployed, along with tomography work utilising multiple concurrent concentration measurements.

  • Eddy Covariance (EC) is considered a key atmospheric technique for quantifying CO2 leakage. However the complex and localised heterogeneity of a CO2 leak above the background environmental signal violates several of the critical assumptions made when implementing the EC technique, including: - That horizontal gradients in CO2 concentration are zero. - That horizontal and vertical gradients in the covariance of CO2 and orthogonal wind directions are zero. The ability of EC measurements of CO2 flux at the surface to provide information on the location and strength of CO2 leakage from below ground stores was tested during a 144 kg/day release event (27 March - 13 June 2012) at the Ginninderra controlled release facility. We show that the direction of the leak can be ascertained with some confidence although this depends on leak strength and distance from leak. Elevated CO2 levels are seen in the direction of the leakage area, however quantifying the emissions is confounded by the potential bias within each measurement through breaching of the assumptions underpinning the EC technique. The CO2 flux due to advection of the horizontal CO2 concentration gradients, thought to be the largest component of the error with the violation of the EC technique's assumptions, has been estimated using the modelling software Windtrax. The magnitude of the CO2 flux due to advection is then compared with the measured CO2 flux measured using the EC technique, to provide an initial assessment of the suitability of the EC technique to quantifying leakage source rates.

  • The Tropical Cyclone Scenario Selector Tool (TC SST) provides an interactive application to interrogate the stochastic event catalogue which underpins the 2018 Tropical Cyclone Hazard Assessment (TCHA18). The application allows users to search for TC events in the catalogue based on location and intensity (either TC intensity category, or maximum wind speed), visualise the tracks and the wind fields of those events, and download the data for further analysis.

  • This dynamic dataset is composed of data layers representing the potential damage arising from the impacts of Tropical Cyclone (TC) related winds on residential houses. The impacts are determined using information on the forecast track of the TC issued by the Bureau of Meteorology, nationally consistent exposure (residential building) and vulnerability (likely level of damage) information maintained by Geoscience Australia. The tracks are based on the content of Technical Bulletins issued by the Bureau of Meteorology’s Tropical Cyclone Warning Centres every 6 hours for active TCs in the Australian region. As such, information is generated intermittently, depending on the occurrence of TCs. The tracks are a forecast only, so do not include past position information of the TC. Forecasts may extend up to 120 hours (5 days) ahead of the forecast time. A wind field around each track is simulated using Geoscience Australia’s Tropical Cyclone Risk Model (TCRM, https://pid.geoscience.gov.au/dataset/ga/77484). This provides an estimate of the maximum gust wind speed over open, flat terrain (e.g. airports). Local effects such as topography and land cover changes are incorporated via site wind multipliers (https://pid.geoscience.gov.au/dataset/ga/75299), resulting in a 0.2-second, 10-m above ground level wind speed, with a spatial resolution of approximately 30 metres. The impacts are calculated using Geoscience Australia’s HazImp code (https://pid.geoscience.gov.au/dataset/ga/110501), which utilises the National Exposure Information System building data and a suite of wind vulnerability curves to determine the level of damage sustained by individual buildings (a damage index). The damage index values are aggregated to Australian Bureau of Statistics Statistical Area Level 1 regions, and can be assigned a qualitative damage description based on the mean damage index.

  • Included fields: Record identifier - hm Bureau of Meteorology Station Number. Year Month Day Hours Minutes in YYYY,MM,DD,HH24,MI format in Local time Year Month Day Hours Minutes in YYYY,MM,DD,HH24,MI format in Local standard time Air Temperature in degrees C Quality of Air Temperature Wet bulb temperature in degrees C Quality of Wet Bulb Temperature Dew point temperature in degrees C Quality of Dew point Temperature Relative humidity in percentage % Quality of Relative humidity Wind speed in km/h Quality of Wind speed Wind direction in degrees Quality of Wind direction Speed of maximum wind gust in last 10 minutes in km/h Quality of speed of maximum wind gust in last 10 minutes Automatic Weather Station Flag

  • Global solar exposure is the total amount of solar energy falling on a horizontal surface. The daily global solar exposure is the total solar energy for a day. Typical values for daily global exposure range from 1 to 35 MJ/m2 (megajoules per square metre). For mid-latitudes, the values are usually highest in clear sun conditions during the summer, and lowest during winter or very cloudy days. The monthly means are derived from the daily global solar exposure. See metadata statement for more information.

  • To provide the solar power industry with a data resource to allow them to assess the economic potential of a site for a solar power plant. Specifically under the Solar Flagship program.

  • Data provided by AIR Worldwide to Geoscience Australia as part of the review of the PCRAFI Phase II project, which examined hazard and risk from TCs and earthquakes in the Pacific. The review was conducted in 2010. This data should be considered in-confidence and is not for distribution or external use.

  • Hourly direct normal solar exposure is the total amount of direct beam solar energy falling over one hour on a surface whose orientation is maintained perpendicular to the solar beam. Typical values for hourly direct normal exposure range up to around 3 MJ/m2 (megajoules per square metre). The values are usually highest in clear skies and decrease rapidly with increasing cloudiness, and also decrease to a lesser extent with increasing haziness and decreasing solar elevation. Global solar exposure is the total amount of solar energy falling on a horizontal surface. The daily global solar exposure is the total solar energy for a day. Typical values for daily global exposure range from 1 to 35 MJ/m2 (megajoules per square metre). For mid-latitudes, the values are usually highest in clear sun conditions during the summer and lowest during the winter or very cloudy days. See LINEAGE below for more information.