No abstract available

We have completed a new Web interface that makes it easier for AGSO's clients to find and order products sold by the AGSO Sales Centre. The new system is on AGSO's Web site at http://www.agso.gov.au/databases/catalog /html. Alternatively, from AGSO's home page at http://www.agso.gov.au, click on the `Products' button and select `AGSO Products' from the pull-down menu of online databases. The new interface is similar to the `Products Database' it replaces, but is based on the `AGSO Catalog', a new metadata system designed to keep track of all of AGSO outputs - including products, publications, datasets and resources. The new interface will be followed shortly by a Web interface for finding publications, papers and articles by AGSO staff members.

The Australian National Marine Data Group was formed by the Heads of Marine Agencies (HOMA) to promote improved interchange of marine data in Australia. The ANMDG held a workshop of practitioners in May 2002 with the intention of identifying major areas of interest and tasks for working groups to address in order to make progress with development of marine data interchange in Australia. This Proceedings CD contains the presentations by speakers in the form of PowerPoint slides and a few Acrobat documents. It was distributed to participants in the workshop.

This report contains a data dictionary for the hydrogeology products released by the Great Artesian Basin Water Resource Assessment

This document lists metadata for the hydrogeology products produced by the Great Artesian Basin Water Resource Assessment.

No abstract available

OZCHEM is AGSO's national whole-rock geochemical database (previously known as ROCKCHEM). This documentation explains the database structure and includes definitions of the database tables and columns (attributes). It is provided with all purchases of OZCHEM data, but can also be purchased separately. The documentation includes summaries and highlights of all the regional data sets that comprise OZCHEM.

Over the past 10 years, Australia has maintained 65-85% self-sufficiency in oil and better than 100% suffiency in gas. This has generated significant societal benefits in terms of employment, balance of payments, and revenue. However the decline of the super-giant Gippsland fields, discovery of smaller oil pools on the Northwest Shelf, and the increasing reliance on condensate to sustain our liquids supply sharpens the focus on Australia's need to increase exporation and discover more oil. Australia is competing in the global market place for exploration funds but as it is relatively under-explored there is a need to simulate interest through access to pre-competitive data and information. Public access to exploration and production data is a key plank in Australian promotion of petroleum exploration acreage. Access results from legislation that initially subsidised exploration in return for lodgement and public availability of exploration and production (E&P) data. Today publicly available E&P data ranges from digital seismic tapes, to core and cuttings samples from wells, and access to relational databases, including organic geochemistry, biostratigraphy, and shows information. Seismic information is being progressively consolidated to high density media. Under the Commonwealth Government?s Spatial Information and Data Access Policy, announced in 2001, company data is publicly available at the cost of transfer, after a relatively brief confidentiality period. In addition, pre-competitive regional studies relating to petroleum prospectivity, undertaken by Government, and databases and spatial information is free over the Internet, further reducing the cost of exploration. In cooperation with the Australian States and the Northern Territory, we are working towards jointly presenting Australian opportunities through the Geoscience Portal (http://www.geoscience.gov.au) and a virtual one stop data repository. The challenge now is to translate data availability to increased exploration uptake, through client information, and through ever-improving on-line access.

PIMS, or the Petroleum Information Management System, is a database that keeps track of 376 000 seismic survey tapes and 2 800 petroleum well logs housed at the National Archives facility, at Chester Hill (formerly Villawood), Sydney - the largest tape archive in the southern hemisphere. PIMS is managed by AGSO's Petroleum Resources Program, which was formerly part of the Bureau of Resource Sciences. The survey tapes and well logs are basic data from petroleum exploration. They are loged under the Petroleum (Submerged Lands) Act, and are publicly available as a stimulus to further exploration.

This report provides detailed descriptions (metadata) of 45 Australian marine environmental datasets that have been generated and collated by the Marine Biodiversity Hub as part of Theme 3 - National Ecosystems Knowledge, Project 1 - Shelf and Canyon Ecosystems Functions and Processes. The report also includes a map for each dataset to illustrate coverage and general spatial structure. The datasets contain both marine environmental and biological variables from diverse data sources and include both new and updated information. Among them, the national bathymetry grid and derived products, seabed sediment grids, seabed exposure (GEOMACS) parameters, water quality data, the national canyon dataset and connectivity layers were produced by Geoscience Australia. Other environmental and biological datasets are the outputs of oceanographic models and collections of various governmental and research organisations. These datasets are important for the success of marine biodiversity research in Theme 3 Project 1 in that they describe key aspects of Australian marine physical, geochemical and biological environments. The physical and geochemical datasets not only characterise the static seabed features but also capture the temporal variation and three-dimensional interactions within marine ecosystems. The biological datasets represent a unique collection of fish and megafauna data available at the national scale. Together, these marine environmental datasets enhance our understanding of large-scale ecological processes driving marine biodiversity patterns. However, we should be aware of the uncertainties and potential errors exist in these datasets due to limitations of data collection and processing methods. Data quality issues of individual datasets have been documented in this report where possible.