This service has been created specifically for display in the National Map and the chosen symbology may not suit other mapping applications. The Australian Topographic web map service is seamless national dataset coverage for the whole of Australia. These data are best suited to graphical applications. These data may vary greatly in quality depending on the method of capture and digitising specifications in place at the time of capture. The web map service portrays detailed graphic representation of features that appear on the Earth's surface. These features include the administration boundaries from the Geoscience Australia 250K Topographic Data, including state forest and reserves.

This report summarises the outcomes of the NPI-AB's second meeting in July 2015.

Australia's search for petroleum began in the onshore basins where extensive areas of Paleozoic marine sequences, some with high-quality potential source rocks, and spectacular outcrop, encouraged sporadic exploration during many decades. For these efforts, there were some rewards, including the discovery of the Mereenie oil and gas field in Ordovician clastics in the Amadeus Basin in 1963 and the Blina oil discovery in Late Devonian and Mississippian carbonates in the Canning Basin in 1981. The most prolific onshore basins, however, have proven to be the Cooper-Eromanga and Bowen-Surat where the gas and oil have been primarily sourced from Permian coal measures. From the late 1980s, the focus of exploration shifted offshore where many large discoveries were made in Mesozoic marginal basins, which today contain more than 90% of Australia's conventional oil and gas resources (Geoscience Australia and ABARE, 2010). Recently, the search for unconventional hydrocarbons is drawing explorers back onshore. The CSG industry has been established on the Permian and Jurassic coal measures of eastern Australia and there is recognition of the potential for shale gas, shale liquids, tight gas, and light tight oil in the Paleozoic and older basins.

This report is a contribution to the 2016 State of the Environment Report prepared by the Commonwealth Department of the Environment. It presents a summary desciption of benthic habitats and communities within submarine canyons, including statistics on the number and regional disrtibution of canyons. An assessment of the current state and trend of canyon ecosystems is also provided.

The ecosystems of northern Australia have very high global rankings in terms of the estimated dollar values of the ecosystem services they provide. Estuaries, which are abundant along the northern Australia coast, are some of the most productive ecosystems on earth, and provide vital nursery habitat for economically important species of fish and crustaceans. Most of the world's population lives in close proximity to estuaries therefore they also tend to be amongst the most degraded marine ecosystems on the planet. However, due to the small population sizes, most of Northern Australia's estuaries are unique in the respect that they are in near-pristine condition. One of the key triggers in estuarine productivity is the fresh water inflow received during the wet season and the flow recession periods afterward. To date there have been no studies of the environmental flow requirements for estuaries in the Northern Territory. As northern Australia develops there will be greater reliance on these important ecosystems for food production and recreation, while at the same time there will be competing demands for freshwater. The designation of environmental flows to river-estuary systems should be based on estuary requirements. If adequate estuarine environmental flows are maintained then it is likely that flows in upper river reaches will also be sufficient for riverine species. Studies of the roles of environmental flows on productivity in estuaries in catchments slated for development will be key in providing the foundation for economically and ecologically sustainable development of these important ecosystems. These studies will also provide additional information on how other uses of estuaries may be developed. For example wetland systems may be used for aquaculture or as watering points. Good information on estuarine processes will not only provide previously unexplored opportunities but help to ensure that our estuaries remain in excellent condition.

Animation for Kaggle showing a plume moving across an array of methane laser measurement paths

Groundwater can be a useful sampling medium for geological investigation and mineral exploration: its composition is highly sensitive to its origin and interaction with minerals in the subsurface, and it responds to faults and other geological structures. Thus there is considerable scope for groundwater adding value to mineral exploration where prospective rocks are covered along basin margins. We are encouraging the uptake of a groundwater hydrogeochemistry to aid mineral exploration through the development of robust and cost-effective methodologies based on numerous site studies. Field guides, notebooks, and field apps are now available. Issues such as bailing vs pumping have been tested, and metrics for contamination and determination of its effects on varying elements have been developed. Vast amounts of groundwater data are publicly available (e.g., http://portal.auscope.org/portal/gmap.html). Mineral systems concentrate various elements in particular zones of the Earth at various spatial scales. For groundwater, this is further complicated by the differing mobilities of various elements depending on the environment. In acidic groundwater environments, for instance, base metals (such as Cu, Zn) are highly mobile, although the background concentrations also can be high due to acid attack on the country rocks. In neutral groundwater environments, base metals commonly have low mobilities but oxy-anions (such as MoO42-, WO42-, AsO43-) can give larger and more consistent haloes. In some terrains, particularly in southern Australia, the upper 20 m of the water column can be 3 pH units lower than deeper groundwater. In such a situation, combining results from shallow and deep groundwaters will give erroneous spatial patterns. Interpreting groundwater geochemical data at the continental scale has required resolving issues related to differing analytical quality, and sometimes differing sampling and analytical methods. Results provide support for litho-chemical discrimination of the Australian continent, and allow assessment of the utility of these methods for varying terrains, e.g., from very acid/saline in southern Australia, through mostly fresh and neutral in the western two thirds of the continent, to sulfate-poor in the artesian-dominated systems of northeastern Australia. In each case, differing element suites and indices should be used for exploration. At the terrain scale, specific groundwater indices delineate large-scale lithological groups and major mineral camps. Such a broad-scale approach may obscure camp-scale variation but does delineate major features, such as the Agnew and Granny Smith gold camps in Western Australia. Other large mineral systems, such as iron-oxide copper gold (IOCG) or copper porphyries may also be observable. At the prospect scale, indicator elements (such as Au, Ni, Cu, Zn, W, As) are commonly valuable, with indices (such as `AuMin or `NiS) developed for specific commodities. Combined with geophysics, this may assist in selecting drilling targets. Hydrogeochemistry, combined with a robust understanding of environmental factors, weathering processes and good quality analytical chemistry, can positively assist exploration at various scales. Continuing research and interaction with explorers has the potential to contribute to the next phase of economic mineral discovery.

In early 2014 the RVIB Nathaniel B. Palmer conducted the first ever multidisciplinary study of the Sabrina Coast continental shelf. This area is remote and generally inaccessible, but biological significance is recognised by its initial inclusion within the proposed East Antarctic representative system of Marine Protected Areas. The datasets collected during this voyage allow analysis of the physical habitat parameters and benthic biota through interpretation of bottom camera images, high resolution multibeam bathymetry, sediment properties and oceanographic measurements, with satellite observations of sea ice also providing important environmental context. The suite of environmental and biological datasets provides evidence for a diverse, relatively high biomass continental shelf community that is strongly structured by the physical environment. The distribution of benthic taxa is most closely related ( = 0.592) to seafloor bathymetry, substrate type, latitude and the occurrence of phytodetritus. Phytodetritus accumulation is associated with muddy/sandy substrates, indicating long term sediment focussing in these areas, consistent with evidence of bottom recirculation features. These softer substrates contain relatively high abundances of mobile holothurians and amphipods. Scattered occurrence of dropstones creates habitat heterogeneity at fine-scales. Harder substrates have high abundances of brachiopods, bryozoans, polychaete tubeworms, a range of massive and encrusting sponges and sea whips. Several taxa are found only on areas of hard substrate, yet have a broad distribution across the sites, indicating that the density of dropstones is sufficient for most sessile invertebrates to disperse across the region. The occurrence of dropstones is associated with significant increases in taxa diversity, abundance and percent biological cover, enhancing the overall diversity and biomass of this ecosystem. This study illustrates how multidisciplinary studies can inform understanding of the drivers of benthic ecosystems, providing important constraints for generating realistic ecosystem models and contributing to our understanding of the sensitivity of this community to environmental change.

This report identifies membership of the NPI-AB and summarises outcomes of the Board's first meeting held on 5th March 2015.

World Political Boundaries. The world boundaries dataset is comprised of free data sources from around the web. Made with Natural Earth (http://www.naturalearthdata.com/). Contains the Admin 0 - Countries cultural layer.