Over 85% of Australians live within 50 km of the coast. Our cities, industries, recreation and culture are closely entwined with this environment. Climate change is altering our coastline at unprecedented rates, with sea level rise, coastal erosion, inundation and weather changes compounding the habitat loss already experienced due to human activity. These changes also impact the built environment, natural resource systems and Australia’s infrastructure planning. Australia lacks a national, cohesive approach to monitor, understand and predict coastal changes. Threats to Australia’s ocean and coasts reinforce the need for an integrated and multidisciplinary capability to help address cumulative threats.

A consortium of NCRIS capabilities have proposed a Coastal Research Infrastructure (CoastRI) Initiative to meet current and future needs of Australian researchers, industry and government; and develop national-scale coastal capability. Priority themes for CoastRI include: erosion; inundation; coastal and estuarine water quality; biodiversity; habitat cover, condition and health; human settlements, infrastructure and industry; and community wellbeing. Planned activities in CoastRI align with three major categories: observing coastal processes, cross-sector modelling and prediction, and data identification, management and integration. This presentation will provide an update on initial investments and activities occurring for CoastRI and future plans for the initiative.

Biography:

Dr Michelle Heupel is Executive Director of Australia’s Integrated Marine Observing system (IMOS). She is a research scientist with over 25 years’ experience working on ecology, conservation and management of sharks and fish. Her career has spanned a range of sectors in marine science (university, public funded research agency, private non-profit research laboratory, joint ventures). In 2022 she was invited to address the twenty-second meeting of the United Nations Open-ended Informal Consultative Process on Oceans and the Law of the Sea, at United Nations Headquarters in New York and is a current member of the UN Ocean Decade Advisory Board. Michelle is considered a national and international leader in the application of ocean data to support policy and decision-making.