June/July 2022 – No. 119
The Australasian magazine of surveying, mapping & geo-information
Mobile mapping Capturing survey-grade point clouds at speed
Official publication of
inside Up, up and away Challenges facing Australia’s drone industry
EO space mission More than $1.5bn promised for new EO satellite
Eyes in the sky Spotting bushfires using satellite imagery
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contents
June/July 2022 No.119
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features 11 Data saves time and money High-resolution imagery for the building industry.
14 Q&A with Greg Tyrrell, AAUS Australia’s drone sector still faces many challenges.
16 Expanding service capabilities Bennett and Bennett go with mobile mapping.
18 National Space Mission EO project promised $1.6 billion in federal funding.
22 GrandSLAM for building scans Leica Geosystems BLK2GO reduces time and effort.
24 Finding myself at Locate First impressions from a firsttime Locate delegate.
regulars 26 The workforce challenge
4
Upfront
A roadmap for solving surveying’s skills shortage.
4
Upcoming events
5
Downlink
7
From the editor
8
News
37
New products
38
SSSI updates
28 Geospatial in government Location data plays an increasingly important role.
30 The industry needs you A new surveying and spatial volunteering strategy.
31 Geospatial education model Inspiring a new generation of geospatial experts.
32 Spotlight on bushfires Satellite-based system detects and monitors bushfires.
35 Public asset management Society needs an ever-evolving geospatial ecosystem.
36 The sky isn’t the limit Interview with drone skills pioneer, Mahmood Hussein. www.spatialsource.com.au 3
upfront Upcoming Events 6–11 June: XXIVth ISPRS Congress https://www.isprs2022-nice.com
GPS sensors are helping to measure land movement in Antarctica. Credit: Matthew Burke. Professor Matt King, Director of the ARC Australian Centre for Excellence in Antarctic Science. Credit: ACEAS.
21–23 June: ROTORTECH 2022 https://www.rotortech.com.au
22–24 June: 2022 National Surveying Congress https://www.consultingsurveyors. com.au
25–26 July: 2022 Disaster & Emergency Management Conference https://anzdmc.com.au/
1–3 August: Survey and Spatial NZ Conference https://www. surveyspatialnzconference.org
The ups and downs of Antarctica
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esearchers from the recently formed ARC Australian Centre for Excellence in Antarctic Science (ACEAS), based at the University of Tasmania, are using GPS sensors to measure land movement across the icy continent — in particular an area the size of Australia known as East Antarctica. “Antarctica is a crucial yet fragile part of Earth’s climate system. The region is also challenging to observe, monitor and understand as it is remote and difficult to reach,” said ACEAS Director, Professor Matt King. “Every day a little bit of Antarctica turns up on the coastlines of the world through sea level rise and coastal erosion. But the big question remains: how Even just finding rocky outcrops in East Antarctica is very difficult. Credit: Matthew Burke.
4 position June/July 2022
is Antarctica changing and by how much?” In the new study, the team places the sensors on previously unobserved rocky outcrops to measure land movement. This helps separate the effects of the land going up or down from the lowering of land ice. “Our study overturns an assumption that the bedrock below the icesheet in Antarctica has been rebounding since the last ice age,” Professor King said. “It is instead going down. We think this is because the ice in this area grew over the last few thousand years and then stabilised.” “By getting into the field and measuring the land movements — with really precise GPS — we can get better measurements of Antarctica’s contributions to sea level change,” he added. But just finding rocky outcrops is one of the biggest challenges. “Rock in Antarctica is like hens’ teeth. And where they are is remote and cold.” Professor King says ACEAS scientists are working on placing more GPS sensors and exploring ways to power them through the Antarctic winters. “We also need to find ways to figure out how the Earth is moving underneath the vast ice sheet there — where there are no rock outcrops,” he said. “That’s a real challenge and there are no simple solutions yet.” n
16–18 August: ITS Australia Summit 2022 https://its-australia-summit. delegateconnect.co/
22–25 August: Advancing Earth Observation Forum 2022 https://www.earthobsforum.org
22–28 August: FOSS4G 2022 https://2022.foss4g.org
5–9 September: 15th Conference on Spatial Information Theory http://cosit2022.iniad.org
6–8 September: Commercial UAV Expo https://www.expouav.com/
11–15 September: FIG Congress 2022 https://www.fig.net/fig2022
2–7 October: Ocean Optics XXV https://oceanopticsconference.org
14–15 November: World of Drones and Robotics Congress 2022 https://www.worldofdrones.com.au/
downlink
Ancient impact This Sentinel-2 false-colour image shows the Shoemaker Impact Structure (formerly known as Teague Ring), 100 kilometres northeast of Wiluna in Western Australia. The impact site (round structure below and to the right of centre) is around 30 kilometres wide and formed following a meteoroid impact sometime between 600 million and 1000 million years ago. It is Australia’s oldest impact crater. Image courtesy ESA, CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO.
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from the editor The Australasian magazine of surveying, mapping & geo-information
Publisher Simon Cooper Editor Jonathan Nally jnally@intermedia.com.au National Advertising Manager Anna Muldrock amuldrock@intermedia.com.au Prepress Tony Willson Production Manager Jacqui Cooper Subscribe Position is available via subscription only. A 12 month subscription (6 issues) is AUD$76.00. To subscribe visit www.intermedia.com.au, phone: 1800 651 422 or email: subscriptions@intermedia.com.au website: www.spatialsource.com.au Position is published six times a year, in February, April, June, August, October and December by Interpoint Events Pty Ltd. ABN: 9810 451 2469 Address: 41 Bridge Road, Glebe NSW 2037 Ph: +61 2 9660 2113 Fax: +61 2 9660 4419 Reprints from Position are permitted only with the permission of the publisher. In all cases, reprints must be acknowledged as follows: ‘Reprinted with permission from Position Magazine’, and must include the author’s byline. The opinions expressed in this publication are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of the publisher. Supported by
The Intermedia Group takes its Corporate and Social Responsibilities seriously and is committed to reducing its impact on the environment. We continuously strive to improve our environmental performance and to initiate additional CSR based projects and activities. As part of our company policy we ensure that the products and services used in the manufacture of this magazine are sourced from environmentally responsible suppliers. This magazine has been printed on paper produced from sustainably sourced wood and pulp fibre and is accredited under PEFC chain of custody. PEFC certified wood and paper products come from environmentally appropriate, socially beneficial and economically viable management of forests. The wrapping used in the delivery process of this magazine is 100% biodegradable.
The industry coming together
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t the start of this year, I announced that Position magazine would be treating 2022 as the ‘Year of the Career’. Why? Because the overall topic of careers, jobs and the dearth of trained professionals is probably the most critical issue facing the surveying, spatial and space sectors at the moment. Businesses and government entities alike are having increasing trouble attracting and retaining enough skilled workers from a shrinking national talent pool as the workforce ages and the flow of new workers slows. This problem has been with us for many years and it has many origins: Older professionals are leaving the workforce; the number of institutions training new professionals is shrinking; other industry sectors are being more successful at attracting young people; there is an overall lack of community awareness of the importance of our industry; the availability of overseas talent has dwindled due to COVID restrictions, and so on. Something must be done, and a plan is needed. And now it looks like we have that plan. The Surveyors’ Trust took the lead and commissioned an extensive study of the problem, culminating in the publication of a major new report, The Australian Surveying and Spatial Workforce – A National Roadmap, produced by former SIBA|GITA general manager, Danica Bakalich. This amazing document lays out the problem and offers step-by-step solutions for resolving the challenge over the short, medium and long terms. What is clear is that this is an industry problem, and we can’t look for a saviour from without — that is to say, we can’t expect governments to bail us out, as so often is the call when particular industries get into trouble. No, the solution to our workforce problems will be found by the industry coming together to take responsibility, set common goals, take solid actions, and act collaboratively and supportively. Only in this way will the challenge be met. Our industry has the know-how and the wherewithal to solve this crisis if we all pull together. Let’s do it. Speaking of the industry coming together, I’m just back from the Locate22 conference in Canberra. More than 750 people came from around the country to catch up on the latest developments, network like crazy and just have a great time. So many people I spoke with told me how great it was to be able to meet their colleagues face to face again and renew old friendships. So congratulations to all of those who were involved in organising Locate22 — you did the industry proud. Jonathan Nally Editor
NEXT ISSUE
August/September 2022 – Issue 120 Regional activities and co-operation — Working together in the Indo-Pacific Aerial surveying and mapping — Technologies and trends
On the land — Agriculture, farming, forestry, environment, sustainability Technology — Drones, RPAs, UAVs, aerial, UUVs and services Advertising booking date: 8 July 2022 Advertising material date: 13 July 2022 Publication date: 4 August 2022 Position magazine, SpatialSource, Interpoint Events and The Intermedia Group acknowledge the traditional custodians of country across Australia, and pay our respects to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures and to their elders, past, present and emerging.
www.spatialsource.com.au 7
news Digital Cadastre Modernisation project updates Victoria’s Digital Cadastre Modernisation (DCM) project is moving ahead, with Land Use Victoria recently completing a successful pilot to integrate the spatially improved (adjusted) data into the Vicmap editing environment. According to Land Use Victoria, as spatially upgraded areas become ready for integration, stakeholders will be invited to view adjusted parcel boundary data in the DCM Integration Viewer prior to publication in Vicmap. The Integration Viewer provides visualisation of the spatial upgrades that have come from digital cadastre modernisation. To date, the project’s
Surveying & Spatial Research team have resolved over 22,000 technical cadastral investigations and queries. As DCM is highly technical, there continues to be a lot of cadastral problem solving to make the digital cadastre more complete and accurate. In collaboration with project partner DSM Soft, 70% of the Victoria’s land parcels have now been digitised from PDF plans and surveys. This work will be completed by February 2023. As land parcels are digitised, this data is made available for use by the spatial and surveying industry. The adjustment of digitised land parcels is also now accelerating — project delivery partners Spatial Vision have completed the initial adjustment of digitised parcels in 20 municipalities. Users can contact digital.cadastre@delwp.vic.gov.au to find out more about viewing adjusted parcel boundary data as they become available.
©stock.adobe.com/au/Maxim Grebeshkov
Cadastre NSW expands with 3D proposed data DCS Spatial Services has announced that the Cadastre NSW service has recently expanded services into 3D proposed data. According to an update in Spatial Services’ most recent Insights newsletter, CadNSW users now have the option to receive a proposed 3D Strata Plan layer to complement the existing 2D layers, enabling councils to plan, assess and approve new developments with support from 3D platforms. “The benefits of these proposed 3D inclusions range from shadow and solar modelling through to visualising impact on city skylines, mapping 3D addressing, predicting impacts on transport and service networks, and supporting virtual environmental impacts studies,” the update says. “The Proposed 3D Strata Plan process borrows much of its data processing from the existing 3D Strata process that has been tested and refined over the Western Parklands City proof of concept area. “CadNSW extends the proposed 3D Strata Plan capture to Development Application (DA) and Subdivision Certificate plans, applying assumed heights where necessary, and reprocessing plans as they progress through the development and assessment process — always returning the most current version of a project. 8 position June/July 2022
“The objective being to continuously provide an up-to-date and accurate 3D representation of proposed strata, in a realworld location and referenced to other geospatial datasets.” Spatial Services says that as the world progresses toward “digital twins and 3D platforms, our 3D/4D capabilities will be continuously refined to reflect and contribute to industry standards. Practical applications of 3-dimensional data influence our development and product offerings.” Image courtesy DCS Spatial Services
OS Maps app now in New Zealand
©stock.adobe.com/au/Maridav
©stock.adobe.com/au/boreala
The OS Maps app from Britain’s Ordnance Survey (OS) has been launched in New Zealand, containing thousands of ready-made trails for trampers and bushwalkers. Users can also produce and plot their own walks, runs and cycle routes as well as downloading maps and routes for offline use — useful for remote areas where there is no mobile phone signal. A variety of map layers are available, including standard street-view maps, NZ Topographic mapping and aerial satellite imagery. Users can also visualise routes in 3D and flythrough a route to get a preview of the terrain and difficulty level. The mapping data comes from Mapbox and OpenStreetMap, with topographic mapping data provided by Land Information New Zealand (LINZ). Ordnance Survey first launched OS Maps in Great Britain in 2015. It has become the country’s most popular navigation app with over 3.5 million users, enabling Brits to navigate with the most up to date mapping as well as providing access to over 1.5 million routes covering 48 million kilometres. The first international launch of OS Maps came in February 2021, when it was introduced to Australia, where it received 85,000 downloads within the first months of release. OS has further plans to introduce the app around the world in other regions including the USA, Canada and mainland Europe. OS Maps is available to download for free from the Apple and Google Play app stores, with premium subscriptions priced at NZ$6.99 for a monthly plan or NZ$39.99 for an annual plan.
Economic impact survey of the NPIC program Geoscience Australia is undertaking an assessment of the economic impact of the National Positioning Infrastructure Capability (NPIC) program. The program provides free and open access to multi–Global Navigational Satellite Systems (GNSS) observations streams from the national network of Continuously Operating Reference Stations (CORS). Users can connect to these data and product streams direct from GA or via a commercial positioning service provider. The CORS network has been designed to support a national positioning capability that provides better than 5 cm accurate positioning solutions in areas with access to mobile phone coverage (delivery via the internet). ACIL Allen has been engaged by Geoscience Australia to conduct a web-based survey for stakeholders with interest in this program to assist with data gathering for the economic assessment. The survey can be found at: https://survey.websurveycreator. com/s.aspx?s=5513a3bd-21e8-477c-b908-5fcc56301e4d. The survey takes between 15 to 20 minutes to complete. There is an additional optional component for service providers that will may take an additional 15 minutes. It can be completed in stages, if necessary, with a facility to save responses. It will remain open until 28 June 2022 (extended from 25 May). Questions can be directed to Alan Smart (Project Director) on 0404 822 312 or Nanumi Starke (ACIL Allen) on 0466 636 345.
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news BlackSky’s new satellites go to work immediately Two new BlackSky high-resolution geospatial satellites were launched on April 3, expanding the company’s constellation from 12 to 14.The pair of BlackSky Gen-2 satellites were delivered to a circular 430-km-altitude orbit by Rocket Lab rocket launched from New Zealand. Amazingly, the satellites began revenue-generating commercial operations for customers within 12 hours following the launch, a company record. BlackSky combines high-frequency monitoring with its software platform, Spectra AI, to deliver real-time alerts, data and information to decision-makers. “Our world needs real-time geospatial intelligence now more than ever,” said Nick Merski, BlackSky chief operations officer. “The rapid integration of these two satellites into commercial operations immediately boosts the capacity of our constellation and the frequency of hourly revisits for our customers that need realtime insights.” The expansion of its constellation improves BlackSky’s daily dawn-to-dusk site monitoring and increases the frequency at which the company can image and analyse a particular site with an average daily revisit rate of 8 to 10 times per day in most locations in the world.
BlackSky’s two new satellites delivered their first insights less than 12 hours after launch. Credit: BlackSky.
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The new Coffs Harbour basemap including hill shade example. Images courtesy NSW DCS Spatial Services.
New basemap options coming for NSW NSW DCS Spatial Services is working on a project to upgrade the NSW basemap, which is currently the default view on its platforms such as the Spatial Collaboration Portal, SIX Maps and NSW Spatial Digital Twin. In a recent news update, Spatial Services said that “We are continuing to expand online services and the upgrade of the NSW basemap will ensure that all NSW Government customers have a dynamic view of NSW Government information displayed in map form.” “Opportunities and enhancements have been identified to improve the range of basemaps to add new designs
into our systems and make [them] available as services.” The upgrade provides seven new basemap designs: • Greyscale • light grey • dark grey • terrain • navigation (roads and admin data) • topographic style, and • topographic style relief, which includes hill shade Spatial Services’ update provided graphics (below) showing the current basemap and examples of the new designs and inclusions. The enhancements will become available via the Spatial Collaboration Portal in the coming months.
partner feature ACCESS METROMAP DATA YOUR WAY
How spatial data saves time and money for the building industry
T
he building and construction industries boomed throughout the pandemic despite the substantial challenges of lockdown-limited movement and supply change shortages. Maintaining and increasing profitability with these ongoing difficulties and rising interest rates presents a challenge to the industry, but a challenge that can be helped by finding better ways to work. MetroMap’s aerial imagery subscription service is already helping the building and construction industries work smarter. Whether conducting detailed site inspections, taking accurate ground measurements, monitoring project change, seeing detailed land and building information, or accessing years of historical imagery without ever leaving your office, MetroMap saves both time and money.
THE BIG PICTURE AND THE PRECISE DETAILS
The MetroMap platform gives users access to super high-resolution and spatially accurate aerial imagery covering more than 8.5 million Australian dwellings and millions of square kilometres in total, all within an easy-to-use web browser platform. They can see an entire city and zoom down to the ground level to check finer details at the individual property level. Site planning, monitoring and assessment have never been easier. Industry
professionals can now open MetroMap, find the site of interest, and use the in-built tools to get their information. MetroMap’s measurement tools give you accurate ground distances, areas and perimeters. Users can create projects and save them to their profile to be available on any device with a web browser. Thanks to accurate measuring tools, subscribers save travel time and reduce unnecessary site visits when they don’t need detailed property surveys. Additional data layers within MetroMap give specific details on existing properties and buildings. You can view zoning, size and area figures, detailed roof information and other features from Geoscape’s trusted building footprint data. Additional cadastre records provide detailed property information, including the land category and government jurisdiction information.
PROPERTY HISTORY
Now users can rewind the clock with decades of archival imagery of Australian capital cities. MetroMap captures new imagery of capital cities and major towns 2 to 4 times per year. Building and construction industry users can see how a building or site has changed over the years or even monitor completed projects into the future. Large expenditures and property acquisitions demand scrutiny, and aerial imagery can provide years of insight that alter purchasing decisions.
The base individual user accounts include access to the web application, the complete image library, measuring tools and unlimited data. Those desiring more advanced features can choose accounts with additional access to georeferenced, highest-quality image downloads and optional property and building feature layer add-ons. Large enterprises build flexible plans according to their team size, feature and data needs. MetroMap’s API-based access is popular among larger organisations and more advanced users who want to add the imagery to their existing project planning systems. MetroMap powers many large enterprises across the public and private sectors that trust the platform’s spatial data as one of their information streams.
WHAT METROMAP USERS SAY
MetroMap shows the big picture and the fine details all in one platform for land developers. Coverage of the booming regional towns makes remote research possible. Graeme Gibson, Property Development Manager from Oakford Homes, explains how MetroMap integrates into his workflow: “Aerial imagery shows me key issues up-front. It’s saving time immediately because it cuts out the need for site inspections for that initial analysis. I can look at the allotment patterns, understand streetscaping as well as review proximity to schools, activity centres and recreational facilities,” he said. “The ability to review the aerial history of a site is extremely important as it gives a holistic picture of previous uses and allows me to accurately determine what has occurred on a site. The fact that all of this can be done in a matter of minutes is the biggest benefit.” n
LEARN MORE Learn more about how MetroMap can help your Building and Construction business: https://metromap.com.au/builders
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news Maptek announces strategic investment in K2fly
Image courtesy Blackshark.ai
Maxar invests in analytics provider, Blackshark.ai Maxar Technologies has announced a strategic investment in Blackshark.ai, a provider of AI-powered geospatial analytics services. The investment will enable Maxar to bring additional 3D capabilities to broader markets for more customers and open up a new revenue stream from Blackshark. The Blackshark.ai platform processes petabytes of satellite imagery in hours, detecting and segmenting objects, roads, vegetation and other infrastructure on the Earth’s surface without human intervention. This information is used to create a comprehensive 3D digital model of the world. Blackshark.ai will leverage Maxar’s global cloudless satellite imagery basemap, Vivid, to create a highly performant and photorealistic 3D map for enterprise and government customers in industries such as gaming, metaverse, simulation and mixed reality environments. For example, this type of offering would enable flight simulator customers to access immersive 3D digital experiences with low latency and global scale… useful for customers who may not need the global accuracy of Maxar’s full Precision3D suite. “We’re excited to partner with Blackshark.ai to extend our geospatial analytics offering and bring a AAA video-game quality 3D digital twin of our planet to market,” said Dan Nord, Maxar Senior Vice President and General Manager of Enterprise Earth Intelligence. “The combination of our offerings positions us to create a digital twin of our planet as real as it gets,” added Michael Putz, Founder and CEO of blackshark.ai. “We cannot wait to see our customers and partners using this to disrupt many industries.”
Maptek has announced a strategic investment in Western Australianbased K2fly, an ASX-listed provider of resource governance solutions for net Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) compliance, disclosure and technical assurance through Maptek Chairman, Peter its platform-based SaaS cloud Johnson, will join the K2fly Board as a non-executive director. reporting solutions. As part of the investment Maptek Chairman, Peter Johnson, will join the K2fly Board as a non-Executive Director. “Maptek is very pleased with the opportunity to become a strategic investor in K2fly. We have a long and successful history of delivering technical solutions that increase the accuracy, safety and efficiency of decision-making for miners,” Johnson said. “K2fly solutions complement our approach, enabling our customers to interact with all stakeholders including local communities, traditional owners, the investment community, regulators and the environment in an improved fashion. “They do this by leveraging technology to ensure the ESG and reporting expectations of the community are met, as well as providing a sustainable platform for enhancement.” Jenny Cutri, Non-Executive Chair of K2fly welcomed Maptek as a strategic investor in K2fly and Peter Johnson to the K2fly Board. “The investment by Maptek makes it K2fly’s largest investor and represents a significant validation of the K2fly business and growth outlook by the world’s largest privately held mining software business,” Cutri said. “Peter’s wealth of knowledge in applying and scaling innovative technological solutions in the mining sector into sustainable and profitable businesses will be invaluable to K2fly. Further, our solutions are adjacent and there are many opportunities for collaboration.”
LatConnect 60, Gilmour partner for EO microsats Perth-based LatConnect 60 (LC60) has signed an agreement to work with Gilmour Space Technologies in Queensland to build and launch the first microsatellite of a planned high-resolution hyperspectral imaging constellation. The satellites will be placed in 30-degree inclined orbits for frequent revisit data capture over the Earth’s equatorial and midlatitude regions. Company executives announced the HyperSight 60 constellation agreement at the 37th Space Symposium in Colorado Springs, USA. “HyperSight 60 will deliver geospatial insights for mid-latitude areas at a level of detail and frequency not possible with other commercial remote sensing systems,” said 12 position June/July 2022
Venkat Pillay, LC60 CEO and Founder. “The addition of Gilmour Space to the LC60 team contributes significantly to the future success of our ambitious plans.” The agreement will see Gilmour Space develop the first 100-kilogram HyperSight 60 satellite on its G-class satellite bus (G-Sat), which will be launched on Gilmour’s Eris rocket from the Bowen Orbital Spaceport in Queensland. The first HyperSight 60 microsatellite is planned for launch in Q4 2024. The microsatellite and subsequent constellation will be owned and operated by LC60. “This agreement would be our second G-class satellite mission on Eris, and we’re excited to be working with the pioneering team at LC60 to bring this significant
Adam Gilmour, Gilmour Space (left), and Venkat Pillay, LatConnect 60, announce the HyperSight 60 agreement at 2022 Space Symposium.
capability to market,” said Gilmour Space CEO, Adam Gilmour. Once the eight-satellite constellation is operational, an hourly revisit rate will be possible at mid-latitude locations between 30 degrees north and south in Australia, Asia, South America and Africa.
S+SNZ welcomes new board chair Survey and Spatial New Zealand (S+SNZ) has announced that it has appointed a new board chair, Mike Benning, who takes over from the long-serving Daniel Williams. Prior to becoming the Chair, Mike was a board member for four years, first joining in 2018. More recently he has also been the chair of the Certification Governance Committee overseeing the Certification Pathways project. Having started out as a registered surveyor for the Department of Lands & Survey (now LINZ) in Whangarei, he moved to Auckland with his family where he spent a number of years working for a land development company. It was here he continued to develop his cadastral survey experience alongside his civil engineering knowledge and property management skills. Mike joined Harrison Grierson in 2000, progressing from technical to management roles. As well as being a member of the executive management team he also built strong governance experience, serving 13 years as an executive director on the Harrison Grierson Holdings Board. In his current role as GM Strategic Initiatives, he leads high performance teams implementing major property projects in both the residential and commercial space. In related news, S+SNZ has announced a group of new participants in its Emerging Leader’s Program. The program gives young professionals an opportunity to gain direct insight into the inner workings of S+SNZ across a wide range of disciplines or governance committees.
The newly announced participants are: • Jason Zhou — joining the Hydrography Stream • Rebecca Sinclair — joining the Land Development & Urban Design Stream • Nicki Shaw — joining the CSNZ Mike Benning, the new • Genevieve Abrey — joining the board chair of Survey and Spatial New Zealand Cadastral Stream • Serg Chirila — joining the Land Development & Urban Design Stream • Michael Lister — joining the Positioning & Measurement Stream • Sheldon McGuire — joining the Cadastral Stream • Mitchell Holyoake — joining the Technical Division • Matt Carson — joining the CSNZ • Daniel Wallace — joining the Engineering Surveying Stream • Jeremy Clark — joining the Spatial Stream • Jared Wright — joining the Engineering Surveying Stream • Cameron de Leijer — joining the Positioning & Measurement Stream • Emma Cook — Young Professionals Council member • Adam Musa — S+SNZ Board Member • Cassie Hardie — Women in Spatial Council member
$15m to develop Defence surveillance satellite Gold Coast-based Gilmour Space Technologies has been selected to develop and launch a new sovereign surveillance satellite as part of a $15 million partnership with the federal government. Announcing the partnership, Defence Minister Peter Dutton said the investment was part of the federal government’s commitment to developing sovereign space capabilities. “In line with our recently released Defence Space Strategy, Defence is closely engaged with the Australian Space Agency and Australian industry to develop and supply sovereign space surveillance and mission system capabilities,” Minister Dutton said. “I am proud to announce this $15 million investment in new military space capabilities to counter threats and assure our continued access to space-based intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance.” “This is a big milestone for an Australian-owned company that’s working hard to develop sovereign space and launch capabilities for our Civil, Commercial and Defence customers,” said Gilmour’s CEO, Adam Gilmour.
“We firmly believe that partnerships like this will help to grow future Space and Defence primes in Australia and lead to more capability for Defence in the years ahead.” Minister for Minister for Employment, Workforce, Skills, Small and Family Business, Stuart Robert, said Gilmour Space Technologies was an Australian success story. “Adam and James Gilmour founded the company nine years ago as a start-up,” Minister Robert said. “Since that time, Gilmour Space Technologies has grown from strength-to-strength to become Australia’s largest space company with 140 employees — and they have job opportunities available right now. “This company launched Australia’s first privately developed hybrid rocket and they are offering people with a wide background of skills in manufacturing, engineering and support roles the opportunity to launch their own career in space right here on the Gold Coast.” Minister Dutton said Defence is aiming to launch a satellite prototype in conjunction with Gilmour by mid-2023.
Image courtesy Gilmour Space Technologies
www.spatialsource.com.au 13
q&a
Q&A with Greg Tyrrell The drone sector in Australia is flourishing, but many regulatory and technological challenges remain.
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he Australian Association for Uncrewed Systems (AAUS) is an industry association formed in 2009 to represent the uncrewed systems (or drone) sector in Australia. Its representation extends to uncrewed vehicles across the air, ground and maritime domains and the emerging advanced air mobility (AAM) sector. We spoke with the CEO of the AAUS, Greg Tyrrell, to get the state of play of the sector and the opportunities and challenges ahead. Drones are big business these days. Is the AAUS’ membership burgeoning?
When we started, the Australian drone industry was small and mainly invested in drone technologies for defence applications. Today we have over 3,000 members who come from all parts of the drone ecosystem, including operators, manufacturers, academia, government and end users. Broadly, our role is to further the advancement of uncrewed systems in Australia, and we primarily do this via advocacy efforts. We also provide value to our membership by holding conferences and networking events to provide information and encourage collaboration. Is the sector becoming more complicated from an operational or regulatory standpoint?
The use of remotely piloted aircraft systems (RPAS) has risen dramatically in recent years primarily due to the advancement, simplification and affordability of the technology over this time. From an operational perspective RPAS are becoming highly automated and easier to use, which is encouraging people with non-aviation backgrounds to adopt the technology. For many applications, RPAS are also becoming more commercially viable. As a result, the take-up has been significant in recent years. The changing demographic towards operators without traditional aviation backgrounds has created some issues for the regulator, but they are adapting quickly to enable low-risk RPAS operations. CASA has created an ‘Excluded Category’ that enables the commercial use of drones for low-risk operations with minimal red tape overhead. 14 position June/July 2022
What were the main results from your recent membership survey?
The survey focused on profiling the RPAS industry, identifying risks and recognising opportunities for industry growth. Regarding the industry profile, we are seeing a trend towards organisations employing drone technologies and operating in the Excluded Category. The most common uses are currently as a tool for infrastructure inspection, surveying, construction and land management. Looking forward two to three years, the industry expects to see more drone operations in emergency services, defence, land management, mining and agricultural applications. Regulatory risk is a significant concern for the emerging drone industry, especially for those wishing to undertake higher risk operations (including operations near populous areas, near aerodromes and at ranges ‘beyond visual line of sight’, BVLOS). Industry wishing to perform these types of operations are reporting long processing times for CASA approvals and uncertainty over future regulatory outcomes. AAUS’ advocacy work has focussed on these issues and we have discussed the data along with potential solutions with CASA and Government. We have been advocating for a regulatory development roadmap for some time, and also the need for greater CASA resources. In recent times, AAUS and its members have rolled up our sleeves and actively participated in technical working groups to assist the industry/CASA co-develop a RPAS and AAM regulatory roadmap.
Regulatory risk is a significant concern for the emerging drone industry, especially for those wishing to undertake higher risk operations.
We are seeing a trend towards organisations employing drone technologies and operating in the Excluded Category.
What are your members telling you they need or want from regulators?
AAUS members are seeking to perform more complex RPAS and AAM operations and seeking clearer and efficient approval processes from CASA. They want to be able to operate larger air vehicles that in some cases will require certification. They also want to improve capability by operating at greater ranges — including BVLOS from the remote pilot and with improved efficiency operating many air vehicles by one remote pilot. The increasing level of autonomy inherent with modern RPAS systems together with regulatory development will greatly assist in achieving these outcomes. Does the wide range of use cases sometimes cause conflict or increase complexity when it comes to regulations and operations?
When looking at RPAS usage, consideration of safety risk is the parameter that tends to drive regulatory complexity. Safety risk consists of ‘air risk’ (risk of collision with other aviation) and ‘ground risk’ (risk of collision with people and property on the ground). Drone applications that occur in higher density airspace and/or over higher-density population areas are the ones that are of greatest air and ground risk and require the greatest regulatory oversight. Characteristics of the drone (size, weight, flight speed and equipage) and the remote operator (licensing and experience level) also contribute to the safety risk. RPAS use in remote and regional areas (mining, agricultural uses) is typically lower risk and is simpler to regulate. RPAS uses that involve delivery in urban areas are typically higher risk and this drives greater complexity in the regulations. It is also worth noting that when considering RPAS or AAM operations in urban areas, regulation of noise and privacy aspects need to be considered. What is the state of play with the use of RPAS near sensitive sites, eg. airports?
The use of RPAS around airports comes with higher air risk and historically this means a more onerous approval process that involves both CASA and Airservices Australia. Depending on your organisation’s level of certification and your personnel’s licensing, different access to the airspace around airports apply. Certified operators are permitted to apply for approval to operate within 5.5 km of a controlled airport whereas recreational and Excluded Category operators are not permitted to fly. (The rules around noncontrolled aerodromes are less restrictive). CASA and Airservices Australia are currently trialling an automated digital airspace authorisation service near Adelaide, Canberra and Perth Airports. This applies to certified organisations operating drones less than 25 kg in mass. The removal of red tape for these approvals has been very much appreciated by industry, Which overseas developments is the AAUS is keeping its eyes on?
Many of the RPAS and AAM policy and regulatory developments described above are also being addressed internationally. Australian governments and agencies have eyes on these international efforts with the aim of learning from them and remaining harmonised.
©stock.adobe.com/au/Gorodenkoff
In some areas, we are behind international efforts and will probably closely follow. In other areas, we are at the leading edge. With low-density airspace and population, Australia offers great opportunity for the emerging RPAS and AAM sectors to significantly impact many applications particularly in regional areas. While AAUS follows international developments, it advocates for Australia to lead the way in developing policy and regulation that make sense for Australia in grabbing these opportunities. What sort of technological developments will change or challenge the sector?
I think that upcoming technological developments will enable industry by improving safety and cost effectiveness of using RPAS. Two examples are the adoption of artificial intelligence (AI) and detect and avoid (DAA) systems. DAA is the ability for the RPAS to detect and avoid other aircraft. The DAA system could be based on the drone or be achieved by connected systems that have situational awareness of all aviation in the airspace. This capability will lessen air risk, particularly for BVLOS RPAS operations, and will dramatically improve range capability of the systems and reduce approval complexity. We largely use drone systems to gather data to assist with an application. Integration of AI agents in RPAS will have a significant impact on the way data are interpreted and ultimately its value in driving efficient outcomes. In a country where labour resources are limited, automation and AI has the potential to revolutionise the way we do things, particularly in regional areas. Are there any other challenges coming up that RPAS users need to know about?
There are many policy and regulatory challenges ahead as RPAS users push for greater scope (and higher risk) in future uses. At a policy level, the federal government is on the front foot and working the challenges with industry to enable the emerging RPAS and AAM sectors. (Check out the Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Communications’ National Emerging Aviation Technologies (NEAT) policy development work). At a regulatory level, CASA continues to develop and evolve safety regulation for RPAS and AAM and is consulting on the regulatory roadmap. The roadmap will give end users a good feel for what is coming up from a regulatory perspective. In addition, CASA and Airservices Australia are developing future airspace designs that will assist with the integration of RPAS and AAM into our airspace. n www.spatialsource.com.au 15
partner feature
Bennett and Bennett expands service capabilities with mobile mapping, deformation and vibration monitoring Southeast Queensland surveying firm Bennett and Bennett invests in NavVis VLX mobile scanning and successfully deploys Senceive deformation monitoring and Omnidots vibration monitoring systems across a range of Infrastructure, Construction, Heritage, and Utilities projects.
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ennett and Bennett has provided land surveying, town planning and spatial services throughout Southeast Queensland for more than 50 years. With more than 100 employees, the company is well resourced for small and large-scale projects and has adapted its business over time to embrace the latest technology and surveying methods. To complement the firm’s terrestrial mapping capabilities, Bennett and Bennett has recently taken delivery of a NavVis VLX wearable mobile mapping platform, sold and supported in Australia and New Zealand by Position Partners. Powered by SLAM technology, the VLX delivers surveygrade point clouds at speed, capturing data as the user walks around the area to be mapped.
Site Map Capability Manager, Liam Thierens, said the NavVis VLX will be used predominantly for Scan to BIM applications. “The VLX fills a gap in our scanning artillery and provides us the ability to quickly capture an environment from all angles without the shadows you find with static laser scanners,” he said. “We’re excited about the potential time savings and efficiency gains we will see from deploying the VLX in conjunction with our other mapping solutions,” he added. In addition to the latest mobile mapping solutions, Bennett and Bennett has also introduced wireless condition monitoring and vibration monitoring technology to provide real-time data to clients for infrastructure, construction and utilities projects. Senceive solutions have been deployed at the Elanora wastewater treatment plan.
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Working with intelligent solutions provider Position Partners, the company first adopted the Senceive wireless monitoring system, which utilises a range of sensors or nodes that are connected wirelessly to a solar-powered gateway. The gateway relays monitoring information in real-time to a web-based reporting platform, giving customers highly accurate data 24 hours a day. Having successfully deployed Senceive solutions on a range of projects, including Gold Coast light rail, Sparkes Hill reservoir in Brisbane’s north, and the Elanora wastewater treatment plan on the Gold Coast, among others, Bennett and Bennett further expanded its monitoring services with the addition of the Omnidots vibration monitoring solutions. On a high-rise tower in Brisbane’s CBD, both Senceive and Omnidots systems were used to check for movement and vibration during excavation work for the Albert Street Tunnel, part of the city’s Cross River Rail Project. “We set up alerts as well as dashboard access for the building manager and the structural engineer on the high-rise building project, which they valued enormously because they could check the information themselves whenever they wanted to,” said Bennett and Bennett company Director, Chris Swane. “I believe they also gave access to some tenants in the building who were particularly concerned about the construction work going on around them and the vibration it was causing to the building. When they had full visibility and could see that the vibration was kept below alert levels, it gave them peace of mind,” he added. As with any new technology, the upskilling and on-boarding process was important to get right, according to Mr Swane. “The support and advisory capacity of the local Position Partners team in Brisbane has been excellent,” he said. “They provided a great deal of advice about the systems and helped us understand the different options and suitability, which changes over time as new technology
Left to right: Geoff Preece, Position Partners’ Market Development Manager Scanning; Claudio D’Anna, NavVis Technical Account Manager APJ Market; Liam Thierens, Bennett and Bennett Site Map Capability Manager; Michael Dutch, NavVis Senior Technical Account Manager; Nima Karkhaneh, Bennett and Bennett Site Map Technical Lead; and Patrick Hughes, Position Partners’ Customer Success Manager Scanning.
Senceive wireless monitoring was used on the Gold Coast light rail.
becomes available. We also relied on them for training and getting the systems configured. I can’t fault Position Partners on the assistance and support we’ve been provided.” Prior to introducing the Senceive wireless monitoring platform, Bennett and Bennett used traditional surveying techniques to monitor movement in structures. “On a historic building, for example, we would have relied on angular measurement — reading multiple angles to a wall and setting up brackets at the top of the structure and at the bottom so that we could measure for any movement,” Mr Swane said. “Those methods take a lot of time, you have to be on site to take those readings, whereas the Senceive and Omnidots systems operate around the clock once it’s setup,” he added. “Then of course there’s the cost to factor in; having a surveyor on site to take those measurements at the standard charge out rate makes it much more cost effective for our clients to have the wireless monitoring systems installed on their sites.”
Mr Swane said that in addition to the constant data feeds and cost savings from wireless monitoring technology, the ability to configure alerts for different parameters of movement or vibration is also well received by clients. “There’s definitely some education involved to explain what these alerts really mean and relate them back to the millimetres of movement they relate to,” he explained. “But the good thing about these systems is that you can set different levels of alerts that perhaps go to different stakeholders. For example, a low-level alert might go to the consultant and the surveyor as a forewarning, but a more critical alert level might go to the client and perhaps the builder on site, so if they hear or see it trigger they know to stop work immediately.” Another benefit Mr Swane cites is that monitoring technology delivers a greater level of traceability. “Clients can compare any potential movement from the start of the year to the end of the year, or with vibration they can analyse trends in activity over time,” he said. Like many surveying businesses, Bennett and Bennett has adapted to embrace newer surveying instruments to offer clients a broader service offering. “The wearable scanner and monitoring systems are the latest additions to the company and are in line with some of the more high-tech emerging services we now offer. From 3D mapping and BIM applications, to conformance reporting, construction and monitoring, it all ties well together and enables us to provide wholistic solutions for our clients,” Mr Swane explained. n www.spatialsource.com.au 17
space Australian government agencies currently use data from satellites such as Sentinel-2. The new National Space Mission aims to add a homegrown satellite to the mix. Image courtesy ESA.
Lift off for the National Space Mission Australia’s National Space Mission for Earth Observation has been promised $1.16 billion out to 2039, with remote sensing calibration as its focus.
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hen then federal treasurer Josh Frydenberg delivered the 2022–23 Budget on 29 March, those pundits who predicted that he would have something for everyone were not wrong — it was designed to delight, and it did. So much cash was splashed around that most media commentators overlooked the $38.5 million per annum earmarked for four satellites, the first phase of a National Space Mission for Earth Observation. The program has been promised $1.16 billion out to 2039 (that’s about $70 million annually). This is on top of $65.7 million to encourage rocket launches from Australia and $46.8 million to be spent on various other aspects of the space industry (see sidebar). Industry leaders say it’s not before time. Glen Tindall, the chief executive of space systems at Electro Optic Systems (EOS) in Canberra, says that as the industry matures, the government needs to develop meaningful space missions in the national 18 position June/July 2022
interest. It’s not enough to fund one-off projects. “You can’t build a sustainable industry like that,” he says. According to the Budget papers, the National Space Mission will be led by the Australian Space Agency (ASA). The prime contractor has not been chosen yet, although it does seem that many subsystems will be sourced from local companies. CSIRO will develop a specification for the satellite and, once it is on orbit, calibrate it. Geoscience Australia will operate the satellites on orbit, as well as establish and run Earth stations to receive the data and distribute it to users. The Bureau of Meteorology will be a major user of the data. The Department of Defence will deliver foundation geospatial information. The ASA has yet to reveal who will launch the satellite. At the time of writing, CSIRO had not detailed the design of the satellite. However, from published sources we know that each satellite will carry a single instrument
JON FAIRALL
— a hyperspectral radiometer. This is usually taken to mean a device that images the Earth’s surface at sufficient discrete wavelengths to be able to re-create the entire electromagnetic spectrum over the range of interest. It is clear the National Space Mission is a response to recent environmental calamities, especially the 2019–20 Black Summer Bushfires. Two enquiries into those fires — the Royal Commission into National Natural Disaster Arrangements and the New South Wales Bushfire Inquiry — highlighted the need for a continentwide map of vegetative fuel states. Extreme flooding has also challenged the existing infrastructure for mapping and predicting the behaviour of large amounts of water. This probably means the sensor will have a bandwidth from the thermal infrared down to the visual at 400 nanometres. Such a sensor could provide a map of hot spots to address fire risks — a key design driver — plus something akin to the Normalised Difference Vegetation Index
“Australia has always relied on foreign satellites... [but now] This is an opportunity for us to go from a consumer to a contributor.” Reece Biddiscombe, Australian Space Agency
NASA
Space sector strategy
(NDVI) generated by NOAA, Landsat and Sentinel satellites. The NDVI measures the difference between near infrared radiation and red light to provide a measure of vegetation density and condition. Such information is already routinely used by farmers and landscape managers. With better temporal and spatial resolution, it would also be of use to firefighters anxious to monitor fuel load ahead of the firefighting season. In a statement to the media, James Johnson, the chief executive of Geoscience Australia said that potential areas of interest include environmental and hazard monitoring, urban planning, water quality and availability, construction, financial services, resources, and weather analysis and forecasting. “With the constellation in place, it will be feasible to provide updated and detailed crop health information to farmers and agricultural forecasters every day or two. Currently, similar data is only available at eight- to ten-day intervals,” Johnson said.
The highlight of the Budget was undoubtedly the money for the National Space Mission, but that was by no means the only, or even the largest portion, of government largesse. The funding takes the total amount committed by the federal government to the civil space sector to well over $2 billion since it established the Australian Space Agency in 2018. It’s not quite as impressive as it sounds, since the industry will have a decade or so to spend it. Still, a lot of money is in play. The government has earmarked $65.7 million over five years from 2021–22 to set the conditions for rocket launches from Australia. The money will be used to fast track the launch of space assets and research projects developed by Australian businesses and researchers. $2.4 million will be foregone over the next five years by removing cost-recovery requirements under the Space (Launches and Returns) Act 2018. This is part of a wider regulatory reform program to streamline interactions between government and industry. A $9.5 million Space Strategic Update will be produced to provide direction for the space industry and, most importantly, on future funding opportunities. A further $3.0 million will be spent over the next two years to build relationships with international space agencies. In addition, $25.2 million will spent on Australian businesses and research organisations working on projects with the Indian Space Research Organisation and the broader Indian space sector. Nor does this include money for Defence to develop space based assets. The 2020 Defence Strategic Update committed $7 billion to ‘transition the Australian Defence force from a consumer to a contributor in space’. Some proportion of that will go to Earth observation. In May 2022, Gilmour Space Technologies announced that it had secured funding to develop a satellite and launch it on an Eris rocket. The contract is part of a $15 million project to develop a sovereign space-based Earth surveillance system for Defence.
www.spatialsource.com.au 19
space CSIRO will lead the development and maintenance of a national network of satellite calibration and validation sites.
Another significant design driver is the need to monitor surface water. The most reliable way of doing so would be with a microwave sensor. However, optical frequencies have been used in the past and presumably will be a feature of the Australian satellites. It is possible to monitor many characteristics of water bodies such as turbidity and algal blooms using indices based on visual and near infrared wavelengths. Provided the device has sufficient spatial resolution, its data would also be of great interest to emergency services for flood monitoring
The EO roadmap
The Budget announcement puts flesh on the Earth Observation from Space roadmap, which was released last November by the ASA. At a briefing for media held after the Budget, Reece Biddiscombe, the director of national missions at the ASA, pointed out that Australia had in-depth experience of Earth observation, but all in the role of
data consumer. “Australia has always relied on foreign satellites,” he says. ”This is an opportunity for us to go from a consumer to a contributor.” He said a national EO capability would give the operators of the satellite the ability to capture uniquely Australian data as well as to contribute to the international Earth observation community. It seems this contribution will be a significant design driver for the overall system. In the last few months, the government has signed cooperative deals with the UK and India, and it is currently negotiating with the US. The US deal is especially interesting. In April the US and Australian governments signed a Statement of Intent at the Colorado Space Symposium. The Statement seeks to ensure the Australian satellites will compliment NASA’s Climate Absolute Radiance and Refractivity Observatory (CLARREO) mission. CLARREO was originally conceived in 2007. At that time, a survey by the US government concluded that
Gilmour Space Technologies
Commercial competition On 6 April, Gilmour Space Technology in Brisbane signed a deal with LatConnect60 in Perth to produce and launch eight Hypersight 60 satellites. Like the satellites produced under the National Space Mission, the Hypersight constellation will carry a hyperspectral imaging system. Under the agreement, Gilmour will develop a 100kg space platform and launch it on one of its Eris launch vehicles. The announcement was made at the Space Symposium in Colorado Springs in April. Gilmour signed the deal on behalf of a consortium of 31 companies. Once all eight satellites are on orbit, LC60 will be able to offer a constellation with hourly revisits over Australia, Asia, South America and Africa. LC60 was founded in 2019. It currently owns exclusive rights to imagery from the S1-4 satellite owned and operated by Surrey Satellite Technology in the UK. S1-4 was launched on an Indian PSLV in 2018 and is currently in orbit 580 km above the Earth. The on-board scanner delivers 80cm panchromatic and 4m multispectral data.
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the biggest single limitation of the current generation of space-based sensors was that their observations were not accurate enough to see the small changes generated by climate change on a decadal timescale. NASA’s strategy is to improve the calibration and on-going validation of the measurements with a suite of new technologies that enable continual changes to the instruments during the life of the mission. The first CLARREO satellite was due to launch in 2017. However, it was hit by Trump-era budget cuts and is now scheduled for 2023. Even then, it will be a ‘pathfinder’ mission — an instrument package that will sit on the International Space Station. The first independent missions will fly during the 2030s.
Calibration of the nation
As a result, the National Space Mission has leapt on calibration as the next frontier of remote sensing. CSIRO’s chief executive, Larry Marshall, says CSIRO will lead the development and maintenance of a national network of satellite calibration and validation sites scattered across Australia. This involves defining small homogenous areas whose reflectance can be accurately measured by terrestrial and aerial sensors. These results can then be compared with the results from the satellite. This network will be used to calibrate both Australia’s own satellites and those of foreign operators. Apart from working in support of NASA, some of this work will be undertaken with funding from the UKAustralia Space Bridge Program. CSIRO will also design, build and manage a new data hub to make the data available to end users, build on CSIRO’s existing strengths in data distribution. The organisation says that the Australian Government currently spends around $100 million per annum on Earth observation from space, a figure that includes the cost of retrieving the data, processing it and then using it in its programs. More than 100 federal and state government programs use data generated by space platforms of one sort or another. On some estimates, these programs cost various governments around $950 million. As it stands, the source for all this data is foreign satellites. Geoscience Australia runs the Landsat down station, which currently receives daily data from Landsats 7 and 8. GA’s archive provides 40 years of continuous data over the Australian
The Australian Government currently spends around $100 million per annum on Earth observation from space.
Data from the National Space Mission satellite might be used for disaster monitoring and response. Image courtesy ESA.
landmass. Landsat multispectral data has been recorded since the launch of Landsat 1 in 1972. Between 1972 and 1979, it was recorded by the US Geological survey. In 1979, a down station at Alice Springs was opened, later joined by one in Hobart. CSIRO currently runs a repository for the European Copernicus Programme. It provides data from the three operational Sentinel satellites with coverage over Australasia, South-East Asia, the South Pacific, the Indian Ocean and Antarctica. Most of this data is processed in the Open Data Cube (ODC), a processing engine that can take in petabytes of data from multiple sensors and turn it into useable form. Data from the ODC drives Digital Earth Australia, a portal that forms the main interface for users of the system.
CSIRO also has a 10% share of NovaSAR-1, a synthetic aperture radar built by Surry Satellite Technology in the UK.
Looking further ahead
Politicians who need to justify their decision to spend money on creating a space industry, have made a big play out of the industrial activity that will flow from a sovereign capacity to build and launch spacecraft. According to numbers provided by the ASA, about 500 people will be involved in the project — most of them will be employed by about 100 sub-contractors. That will be welcome news for a new generation of Australians who will work in space engineering. Even so, the politics of all this may yet turn out to be its Achilles heel, says EOS’
Glen Tindall. He says that to build an industry to create, maintain and operate a satellite constellation will require a longterm commitment from government. “It takes decades to bring these missions to fruition,” he says. So far, there is no word as to what will happen when the first four satellites are built and operational. Will there be a follow-on program? Will we have a sustainable industry in remote sensing? The ASA says the mission will provide a framework for entities across government to consider opportunities for future missions. Yet as with so much in the space industry, it will depend on the whim of the government of the day. n Jon Fairall was the founder and inaugural editor of Position magazine. www.spatialsource.com.au 21
partner feature
The Leica Geosystems BLK2GO handheld imaging laser scanner weighs just 775 grams, including the internal rechargeable battery.
A GrandSLAM for building scans The Leica Geosystems BLK2GO handheld imaging laser scanner dramatically reduces the time and effort involved in building scans.
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.R. Kennedy’s Western Australia team recently undertook a client site walk in conjunction with local surveying company, Links Surveying, who needed to capture an existing semioccupied office complex and create leased floorplans. It was decided that the Leica Geosystems BLK2GO handheld imaging laser scanner was the ideal product for the job, as it would provide the best and most timeeffective solution for the task. The BLK2GO recreates spaces in 3D by capturing images and dimensionally accurate 3D point clouds in real-time and uses SLAM (Simultaneous Localisation and Mapping) technology to record the user’s trajectory through space. The LIDAR data is combined with the imagery automatically to produce a colourised point cloud. The device can scan over and under objects, through rooms and doorways, around corners, and up and down stairwells. The SLAM spatial awareness technology enables the BLK2GO to always 22 position June/July 2022
know where it is and where it has been. According to Leica Geosystems, the BLK2GO is the smallest dual-axis LiDAR available with what is claimed to be bestin-class accuracy. The unit is enclosed in a fully protected and encapsulated dome that scans up to 420,000 points per second. Both axes continually spin while scanning. There’s no need for a tripod, and data is collected on board. The vision system is a 12-megapixel camera for high-contrast imagery plus three panoramic cameras for visual navigation via SLAM, point cloud colourisation and capture of panoramic imagery. The handle contains the WLAN connectivity electronics, a rechargeable battery capable of 45 minutes of continuous scanning, data storage for six hours of scans, and a USB-C port for fast data transfer and edge computing. A light guide that encircles the BLK2GO provides user guidance while scanning and communicates the device status and data quality. All up, the unit weighs in at just 775 grams. The BLK2GO’s GrandSLAM technology
combines the high-speed, dual-axis LiDAR, multi-camera vision system and an inertial measurement unit to make the unit self‑navigating.
Walk and scan
For a job of this kind, a surveying company traditionally would use a Leica Disto to measure the overall room sizes before later processing these readings through its chosen CAD software. Doing it that way using a Disto or total station could have taken two to three days just to work through the building and capture only the room dimensions one by one… let alone the further work that would have had to be done to manually interpreted the data into the CAD software. With the BLK2GO, that kind of workflow is a thing of the past. The C.R. Kennedy team met up with Links Surveying on site and, before getting into the scanning, discussed the best way of tackling the job. Once ready to go, the team spent a total of just three hours at
The SLAM spatial awareness technology enables the BLK2GO to always know where it is and where it has been.
the site with a total of 106.97 minutes’ worth of scanning time split across 30 different walks. Each tenancy was split into various scans depending upon its layout, with walks conducted through the common area of the building to enable the Leica Cyclone Register360 software to link the scans together with sufficient overlap. Some of these walks even took place through active tenancies with an abundance of moving people — this did not cause any issues and did not affect the finished point cloud or increase the time taken to scan. The next stage was to process the data through Register360 back in the office. This involved importing 70 GB of data, reviewing the individual scans, cleaning up any troublesome point cloud noise and linking the 30 different walks across the two floors and the exterior of the building. This
took around four hours, most of which was spent on the import phase. Once the team was happy with the data and had performed the QA checks on the scan bundle, it was time to export the data out to an .lgs file for linking into CAD software through Leica CloudWorx. In this case, the team decided to model out the floor plans using Autodesk’s Revit and Leica CloudWorx for Revit. It took less than two days to model the site (windows, floors, doors and walls) using the point cloud data and produce leased area floor plans and room schedules. It’s not an exaggeration to say that, from start to finish, a completed product can be generated within three days for a job such as this, all thanks to the capabilities of the BLK2GO. n Information provided by C.R. Kennedy and Company.
Scanning a building with the BLK2GO Time at Site:
3 hours (2 hours spent scanning)
Site type:
Two floors of semi-occupied office space
Site area:
5,026m²
Raw data size:
30 walks totalling 70 GB
Processed data size:
5.17 GB .lgs file / 608 MB .rcp file
Processing time:
4 hours (using Register360)
Modelling time:
2 days (using Revit and CloudWorx)
ELECTRICAL ROOM 20 m²
OFFICE SPACE 15 m²
COMMON SPACE 74 m²
OFFICE SPACE 22 m²
STORE ROOM 193 m²
COMMON OFFICE 189 m²
UAT 6 m²
TOILET 11 m²
TOILET 2 m² STORAGE 1 m²
AIRLOCK 3 m²
OFFICE SPACE 16 m²
TOILET 2 m²
W/C 2 m²
W/C 2 m²
TOILET 1 m²
TOILET 1 m²
OFFICE SPACE 11 m²
W/C 2 m² BOH 11 m²
W/C 2 m²
TOILET 8 m²
TOILET 13 m²
OFFICE SPACE 16 m²
MEETING ROOM 35 m²
LEVEL GROUND FLOOR
TENANCY (INDICATIVE) BASE BUILD
4
GROUND FLOOR
TENANCY 1
25
704 m²
GROUND FLOOR
TENANCY 2
10
262 m²
ROOMS
Area 563 m²
GROUND FLOOR
TENANCY 3
2
GROUND FLOOR
TENANCY 4
4
153 m²
GROUND FLOOR
TENANCY 5
10
530 m²
41 m²
GROUND FLOOR
TENANCY 6
5
140 m²
GROUND FLOOR Grand total: 68
TENANCY 7
8
119 m² 2513 m²
AMENITIES 22 m²
AIRLOCK 12 m²
OFFICE SPACE 19 m²
GROUND FLOOR ROOM SCHEDULE
COMMS 4 m²
OFFICE SPACE 16 m²
The Leica Geosystems BLK2GO handheld imaging laser scanner weighs just 775 grams, including the internal rechargeable battery.
CAFE 89 m²
STORE 12 m²
COMMON OFFICE 333 m²
MEETING ROOM 14 m²
MEETING ROOM 26 m²
MEETING ROOM 20 m²
Enter address here Room 22 m²
ENTRY/RECEPTION 28 m²
COMMON WALK SPACE 347 m²
No. OFFICE SPACE 16 m²
COMMS 6 m²
MEETING ROOM 11 m²
COMMON SPACE 31 m²
OFFICE SPACE 13 m²
TOILET 2 m²
BREAKOUT 40 m²
Date
AMENITIES 17 m²
AIRLOCK 4 m²
TOILET 6 m²
OFFICE SPACE 16 m²
Description
COMMON OFFICE 34 m²
TOILET 3 m² TOILET 12 m²
OFFICE SPACE 11 m²
AMENITIES 6 m²
AIRLOCK 9 m²
CLEANERS 2 m²
MISC 3 m²
OFFICE SPACE 16 m²
COMMON OFFICE 142 m² OFFICE SPACE 14 m²
TOILET 12 m²
UAT 4 m² COMMON OFFICE 400 m²
OFFICE SPACE 14 m²
OFFICE SPACE 14 m²
OFFICE SPACE 15 m²
Ground Floor 1 : 100
A general arrangement plan of the scanned building, based upon Point Cloud Data and generated through Revit.
Project Number
Overhead view of the scanned building’s ground floor point cloud data, A101 via Register360. Project number Date
Drawn by
Checked by
Scale
Issue Date
Author
Checker
1 : 100
20/10/2021 2:21:37 PM
1
OFFICE SPACE 15 m²
Isometric view of the project through Revit.
www.spatialsource.com.au 23
conference
Finding myself at Locate22 Some first impressions from a first-time attendee at the annual Locate conference.
JONATHAN NALLY
I
took over the role as editor of Position magazine and SpatialSource.com.au in March last year, right in the middle of the pandemic and its concomitant lockdowns. The disruption COVID caused to travel and to events such as conferences, meant that I was essentially unable to go out and meet people in the industry and introduce myself. A very unusual situation to say the least. So it was with great anticipation that I made my way to Canberra in late May to attend the Locate22 conference. This was to be the first time that most industry members had had a chance to meet face to face since the pandemic began, so I was eager to get involved and meet as many people as I could. And Locate didn’t disappoint. What a marvellous event it was. There was a buzz in the air, as delegates old and new got together and renewed friendships or made new ones. It was clear from the many conversations I had, that everyone had been bursting to socialise once again after such a long period of isolation. And for me, it was a chance to meet many of the people with whom I had until then only been able to correspond via email, or over the phone. I have to say that, as a newcomer to this industry, from first observations it is clear that the surveying and spatial field is filled with genuine, likeable, friendly people. Maybe one of the reasons for that is, as someone remarked during the course of the event, this industry is neither too big nor too small — it is just the right size for
retaining a sense of authentic camaraderie. But the size of the industry and its workforce was one of the main topics of many discussions and presentations. As everyone is aware, workforce woes — that is, the dearth of trained professionals coming into the sector — are critical at the moment. The problem ranges from a shrinking education system, to attracting talent in the first place, and to retaining that talent once it is in the industry. There’s a lot that needs to be done to solve this problem, which is why it was great to see the recent release of the report, The Australian Surveying and Spatial Workforce – A National Roadmap, prepared for The Surveyors’ Trust by Danica Bakalich (see page 26 of this issue). Improving diversity is one important element in bolstering the workforce, not just for increasing the total number of industry participants, but also for all the other tangible and intangible benefits it can bring. I have to say that one thing that really struck me about the APSEA awards ceremony held
on the second night of the conference, was the number of women who were nominated for awards, and especially the number who received awards. I know there is a still a very long way to go in improving female representation in surveying and spatial, but if the number of female APSEA awardees can be used as a guide, then trust me — this industry is streets ahead of others in which I have worked. The need to attract more young people into the profession is another thing that stands out. Many of the young professionals present at Locate called for more support and opportunities from both the public and the private sectors, in terms of offering internships and other experience-building opportunities. More mentors are needed from within the Australian surveying and spatial community, so please contact SSSI (which is running a mentorship program) if you think you can help. There were many other important themes covered at Locate22, one of which was data. Data, data, data was the message
2021 Asia-Pacific Spatial Excellence Awards INDIVIDUAL AWARDS
INDUSTRY AWARDS
Professional of the Year (Winner): Kellie Dean (Vic) Professional of the Year (Highly Commended): Stuart Caie (NZ) Future Leader of the Year Award: Jennifer Brindle (SA) Diversity & Inclusion Award: Andrew Dowding (WA) Educational Development Award: Zahra Gharineiat (Qld) Postgraduate Student Award: Amelie Jeanneau (SA) Undergraduate Student Award: Pearl Ontse (WA) Vocational Education Training Award: Jason Hanckel (NSW) President’s Award: Amelia Davies Eminence Award: Greg Scott
Workforce Development & Inclusion Award plus JK Barrie Award: Winyama and NGIS Environment & Sustainability Award: Australian Institute of Marine Science, QUT (Queensland University of Technology), Accenture Australia, Palau International Coral Reef Centre, Wildlife Conservation Society Fiji, Marine Ecology Consulting and The University of the South Pacific Spatial Enablement Award: Stantec and Tauranga City Council Technical Excellence Award: Critchlow Geospatial Innovation Award – Small Business: Fox and Associates Innovation Award – Medium to Large Business: NSW Department of Customer Service Award for International Partnership: NGIS Community Impact Award: WA Department of Health
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from many of the speakers — the growth of data, the ways in which it is being used and how it should be put to use in the future. There is an urgent need for more data specialists, especially those with knowledge of AI and ML. Melissa Harris noted “unprecedented” government support across many aspects of the industry, including lots of money going into space, digital twins and digital cadastre. She also mentioned some impressive statistics, such as 500 million downloads of Victorian government data to date. She also made the point that everyone needs to get with the GDA2020. In summary, I thoroughly enjoyed my time at Locate. It was filled with informative and thought-provoking presentations, enjoyable and friendly meet-ups and social occasions, a buzzing exhibition space, and lots of people passionate about this industry and the vital role it plays in our society. I’m already looking forward to attending next year’s event, and I hope to see you there too. n
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year of the career
Solving the workforce challenge
JONATHAN NALLY
The surveying and spatial industry has a solid new plan for solving its looming workforce crisis.
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new report into the surveying and spatial industry’s critical skills shortage and ongoing career challenges, sets out a detailed roadmap for how to resolve the problems and build a stronger, better-equipped workforce for the future. Commissioned by The Surveyors’ Trust and authored by former SIBA|GITA general manager, Danica Bakalich, the report — The Australian Surveying and Spatial Workforce – A National Roadmap — makes five solid recommendations (see sidebar) for addressing surveying and spatial career challenges.
A plan to tackle the problem According to the paper, “Workforce shortages for surveying and spatialrelated occupations have been looming for over a decade. Unless action is taken by the industry, the growing shortfall will continue unabated.” “While in the recent past various
recommendations have been developed through workforce gap analysis reports…, little coordinated and sustained action has been undertaken to progress associated implementation risks,” it adds. “It is plausible that had a coordinated, structured plan been implemented at the time of the earlier workforce analysis, the current situation may have been avoided. This is not to criticise past decisions but rather to emphasise the time for action is now.” The paper “advocates for the industry to adopt a sustainable, holistic approach to workforce planning and implementation, underpinned by collaboration of a wide range of industry sectors and representative bodies.” “To fully address workforce capacity and capability needs, it is recommended that planning and program design be informed by long-term workforce development strategies and implementation building on evidence-based decisions
relating to policy and regulatory frameworks, education and training pathways, workforce structure and economic development influenced by technology adoption, investment and global competition for talent.” The paper goes on to say that, taking into account the “pathways individuals take to make informed decisions to be part of the industry” — whether via the traditional educational and training path or experience-based from other related sectors — “the approach needs to be inclusive to understanding the nature of the surveying and spatial workforce today and where it is likely to go into the future across technical and non-technical functional areas.” “It needs to re-frame the definition of occupations to incorporate the whole workforce and have in place an accompanying occupation taxonomy aligned to a national competency framework to which all stakeholders can refer.”
The vast majority of stakeholders identified there was a problem but could not articulate the solution.
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Five-step plan for workforce reform The workforce Roadmap makes five recommendations for initiatives to tackle the surveying and spatial workforce problem: 1. Led by the industry, formalise a national Surveying & Spatial Industry Workforce Taskforce to shape workforce development programs, influence skills investment, evaluate impact and ensure continuity. The Taskforce should represent the ecosystem of stakeholder groups underpinning skills development, employment and licensing of professionals. It needs to drive a program of work that aims to achieve goals and report back to industry its performance. Its primary focus should be on workforce capacity and capability issues not industrial issues, and it should ensure the Taskforce is aligned with all industry-related workforce development initiatives, including the Space+Spatial 2030 Roadmap. 2. Led by the Taskforce and supported by industry (including associations), conduct biennial Environmental Scans to understand the problem, forecast peaks and troughs in workforce demand, evaluate the skills pipeline and anticipate changing market conditions that will impact productivity and access to skills. This is to enable evidence-based decision
Some of the workforce opportunities identified by the paper include looking at: • Current systems to support skills and career development solutions/options • Pivot points to change the direction and career pathways to strengthen career choices and upskilling, reskilling and cross-skilling options • Opportunities to leverage career pathway options with associated industry sectors such as mining, ICT etc; and • Identifying learning and career pathways through cadetships, internships, apprenticeships, work integrated learning and so on. The paper also points out that “a competent and experienced profession drives confidence from the public in the cadastre”. “The surveying and spatial industries are key contributors to supporting this level of confidence recognised by all levels of the profession, from entry level to the highest ranks of the profession as a Licensed Surveyor. “Keeping focus on evaluating and improving (continuous improvement) the education, training and accreditation system to meet the needs of industry and society is becoming more [important] as the composition of modern workplaces change as well as the legislation impacting not only the cadastre but technology, big data and industrial relations.” The paper says that “Wherever possible, it is recommended that all program design and delivery within the framework is undertaken by existing organisations. This is to support a rationalisation
making and must inform programs and support industry in its planning, provide information to better inform government advocacy and profile the breadth and depth of the industry. 3. Led by the Taskforce, develop a national Surveying & Spatial Competency Framework integrating jurisdictional requirements and mapped to the CRSBANZ national surveying framework (in development) and jurisdictional frameworks to support greater harmonisation and clarity around skills needed throughout the workforce. 4. In consultation with industry, develop a Taxonomy of Occupations to give definition to job families, functions and tasks across the surveying and spatial workforce, aligned to the competency framework. Incorporate ANZSCO and industry defined occupations. 5. Led by the Taskforce, develop a National Skills and Career Pathway to help inform and influence career choices and provide greater visibility with education and training pathways. Undertake a national audit of courses offered across school, vocational education and training, university and industry certifications (peer review, micro credentialing etc).
of representative bodies and to avoid confusion resulting in disaggregation of effort and dilution of funds better used to support skills development programs.” Interestingly, the report says that in most of the consultations conducted during the writing of the paper, “the vast majority of stakeholders identified there was a problem but could not articulate the solution apart from the need to diversify the workforce and drive more students into University programs.” “Indeed, in some cases, there were some disputes around the perception of the skills shortage ‘problem’,” the report says.
Industry support
The report has been welcomed by industry bodies such as SSSI and SIBA|GITA, which have thrown their support behind the call to action. Both organisations have said they agree with the report’s observations and the approach needed to address the problems. SIBA|GITA Chair, Alistair Byrom, said workforce planning and development had emerged as critical issues for the geospatial sector. “SIBA|GITA is collaborating with SSSI on plans to ensure the future growth of Australia’s surveying and spatial sector is secured by a skilled workforce,” said Byrom. “As the need for surveying and spatial services and technology increases, workforce planning and development will be increasingly pivotal to ensuring the sector has access to the right skills and capability mix needed to meet demand.
“Australia needs a relevant and skilled surveying and spatial industry workforce to be assured of a thriving industry in the immediate and emerging future.” SSSI President, Paul Digney, said for innovation and growth within the geospatial sector to occur we need to invest in our workforce and commit to building industry capacity and capability. “This report has highlighted that if we don’t accelerate action, we will continue to experience significant skills shortages and expertise if a co-ordinated approach is not taken to address this,’ he said. “It is a wake-up call to the geospatial sector. We must act on the recommendations put forward or risk our sector not reaching its full potential.” The 81-page report is a very substantial piece of work, and Danica Bakalich is to be congratulated for the huge effort involved in researching and writing it. Speaking at Locate22, Byrom said that he “would like to make special mention of the work Danica Bakalich has undertaken,” adding that the report could not have been successfully completed without Bakalich’s wide “experience and wealth of knowledge on workforce topics”. If you’re interested in helping to solidify the future of surveying and spatial in Australia, you should download and read the report from The Surveyors’ Trust’s website (thesurveyorstrust.org.au) and provide your feedback — the future of our industry depends on everyone becoming invested in solving the challenge. n www.spatialsource.com.au 27
location data
Geospatial’s role in government services Location data is playing an increasingly important role in enabling timely provision of government services, including critical public safety initiatives.
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ne of the highlights of the presentations at the Locate22 conference, was the plenary address by Dr David Gruen, Australian Statistician and Agency Head of the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS). Dr Gruen gave the audience an insight into how government uses data, especially location data, in the provision of services. The ABS is collaborating with many other government entities to further the use of geospatial data and increase geospatial data literacy across the Australian public service (APS). What follows is an edited version of Dr Gruen’s address, the full version of which can be found on the ABS website at https://www.abs.gov.au.
Building geospatial data capabilities
In the leadup to this conference, I was interviewed for a podcast [and] asked about my first exposure to geospatial data. While I have undoubtedly encountered geospatial information many times in my career, a memorable example was developing the Drought Map in response to the millennial drought. The Drought Map provided a visual representation of the critical geospatial aspects of the drought, as well as the relevant community and government services — a visual representation that was both compelling and easy to understand. More generally, location data and insights provide critical inputs for governments, business and the community to improve decision making at the local level — for example to support first responders to an emergency event or in preparation for Australia’s high-risk weather season. These data also inform the best places to build critical services like hospitals, breast screening centres and health services for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. They help inform investment in critical infrastructure for economic development or climate risk 28 position June/July 2022
mitigation, regional economic development strategies, and the delivery of employment and education services and programs. The increase in the types and amount of data from both the public and private sectors has led to rising demands for information from users. We have responded with collaboration and partnerships across government and with the broader data community to build capability, tools, and processes to securely use, share, and understand data across the APS and with other governments. In order to make them most of this rapid growth in data availability, we need to build workforce data skills and capability across the APS. Working on data used to be predominantly the domain of statisticians, economists, geospatial analysts and meteorologists. These days, and increasingly, most roles in the public service (and indeed in many spheres of work) require some level of data literacy. The APS Data Profession is playing a major role uplifting workforce capability across the public service. [It was] launched in September 2020… [and] I was appointed Head of Profession, with the ABS as lead agency. At the centre of the work program is the Data Profession Strategy, which addresses the need to strengthen data capability overall, as well as build niche expertise for specialist data users — with geospatial being a prime example of a specialist skill. The Program aims to ensure the APS can attract, develop, and retain people with the data capabilities required to harness the unprecedented growth in the availability and value of data. Late last year, we collaborated with Geoscience Australia, the National Recovery and Resilience Agency (NRRA), and the Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Communications to run a recruitment round specifically for geospatial specialists. This round attracted a strong field of
140 applicants from across industry and government, enabling us to fill over 20 geospatial specialist roles across the APS from operational analysts (APS5s) to Senior Managers (EL2s) with the majority coming from outside the APS. Given the success of this recruitment round, we plan to run a similar process toward the end of 2022. We’ve also supported a mobility program of immersive learning experiences, which develops specialist data capability for APS employees through job swaps or secondments. So far, we have facilitated 13 short-term arrangements, where APS staff with data expertise work temporarily in another agency or department. Geospatial specialists have had a prominent place in these placements, with moves between ABS, Geoscience Australia, the Bureau of Meteorology, the Department of Agriculture Water and Environment, and the newly formed Australian Climate Service.
Australian Climate Service
[We] are an active partner in the Australian Climate Service, or ACS for short. The ACS was established last year as a virtual partnership, bringing together expertise and data from the ABS, the Bureau of Meteorology, CSIRO and Geoscience Australia. The role of the ACS is to help the government and the community better understand the threats posed by natural disasters, including those that have been intensified by climate change, and limit their impacts now and in the future. The ACS delivers data, expertise and advice to two customers: the newly formed NRRA and Emergency Management Australia (EMA). The most recent floods in Queensland and NSW saw ACS provide rapid response to data requests to help these agencies understand developments on the ground. As part of the ACS effort, ABS provided data to NRRA within 24 hours to help them estimate the population adversely
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The COVID-19 pandemic and recent natural disasters have further raised our customers’ interest in location data. Dr David Gruen, ABS
affected by the floods. The request came in on a Friday evening, to feed into an urgent briefing that weekend. We mobilised quickly, established data sharing agreements, prepared the data, and set up a secure transfer mechanism to get the data to NRRA by early Saturday afternoon. The data was based on the ABS Population Grid, which combines the latest ABS regional population estimates with an enhanced version of the 2020 Geocoded National Address File (or G-NAF) from Geoscape Australia — who also provided quick agreement to share the enhanced data. ABS provided estimates of population at a Statistical Area 1 (SA1) level modelled down to the address level. NRRA then used these point estimates of population to dynamically estimate the number of people affected, by matching the points to flood extents as they moved and changed. These are just a few examples of what the APS is currently doing with data to integrate different data sources, including geospatial data, to meet critical information needs. It is worth reflecting that not so long ago we couldn’t do these things because there was much less sharing of data between agencies; the supply of data was more limited because digital platforms had not reached a level of maturity that enabled the generation and integration of large amounts of data; and we didn’t have ready access to the required technology, such as cloud storage. We’ve come a long way but undoubtedly, we can do much more provided we continue to lift data capability across the APS and in the wider community.
The passage of the Data Availability and Transparency Act in March 2022 is also an important part of this journey and will be a key enabler supporting our future efforts.
ABS location capability uplift
Also of interest to this audience is the work we are doing at the ABS to uplift our own location information and geospatial technology capabilities. This has been in response to increased interest by our key customers in using location data and local area insights to identify and respond to economic, social and environmental challenges. The COVID-19 pandemic and recent natural disasters have further raised our customers’ interest in location data and analysis by demonstrating their invaluable role in responding to challenges with a significant geographical dimension. The ABS has always provided much local and regional socio-economic data for use in location analysis. Our Population and Agricultural Censuses have been rich sources of data on local communities and for small population groups. New data from these censuses will be released later in 2022 — with the first tranche of Census data to be released on June 28. I suspect many of you are eagerly awaiting the new small area census data that will become available then. The ABS is actively working to go beyond these traditional sources of socio-economic small area data. As a first step we created a new Location Insights Branch in June 2021. It is a virtual team that now includes over 70 staff located in Canberra, Adelaide, Melbourne, Brisbane
and Hobart. This branch covers our new work on the Australian Climate Service and Digital Atlas. The new Location Insights Branch consolidates ABS’s existing location and geospatial programs — our statistical geography, geospatial analysis and technology area, our statistical address register, and our team that compiles a wealth of small area socio-economic statistics. This branch will play a key role in ABS’s ambition to use the new data sources I mentioned earlier to deliver additional, timely location-based insights for our economy, people and environment. One example where we are already exploiting geospatial data is our use of Earth Observation (satellite) data products form Geoscience Australia and ABARES. We have used these data to compile and release the first detailed set of National Land Accounts, which will inform environmental decision making across Australia. This branch will also feed these new and existing data sources into web-based data services for the Australian Climate Service and other users. A focus here is to ensure the data gets into the hands of the Emergency Management Australia and the National Recovery and Resilience Agency to enable better planning and preparedness for natural hazards and disaster response and recovery. In addition, we will be working with Geoscience Australia on the Digital Atlas program to increase the amount of local area socio-economic and geospatial data that is readily available and accessible for use in location analysis and decision making. n www.spatialsource.com.au 29
community commitment
Industry volunteering strategy released SSSI is seeking input on a program for using surveying and spatial skillsets for the benefit of the community.
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he Surveying & Spatial Sciences Institute (SSSI) has launched the Surveying & Spatial Volunteers Strategy 2022–25, which was prepared by SSSI’s Disaster Management and Recovery Special Interest Group The Strategy aims to facilitate surveying and spatial volunteerism across Australia and globally. The Strategy document is consultative and represents the first stage in seeking broader input and support for a volunteer program targeted at using surveying and spatial skillsets for community resilience building. Camaraderie can develop when teams of surveyors and spatial professionals work together to make a difference to the community. This was demonstrated when the international geospatial community joined Australian volunteers to undertake mapathons to support bushfire readiness and recovery after the 2019–20 east coast bushfires. Volunteerism presents an opportunity to use the sector’s reach, skills and expertise, and build capabilities and arrangements to support the wider community to prevent, prepare, respond and recover from natural disasters.
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SSSI says the aim is to work with existing volunteer organisations and networks to provide opportunities for its members and the surveying and spatial sector more broadly. It will work closely with government and non-government organisations to understand the trends, issues and needs across the sector, which will enable the sector to adapt and develop projects targeted towards volunteering where it matters most. According to the SSSI, for many of its members the pathways to volunteering are not clear, and the time critical nature of some activities means that opportunities are often missed. There is also a lack of national coordination, and a disconnection between available volunteering opportunities and peoples’ interests. SSSI says there is a need to make it easier for members of the profession to get involved. In a statement accompanying the release of the Strategy, SSSI said that “… we can’t do this alone. This initiative will require a collective effort to develop the necessary pathways and partnerships to suit the various community needs and preferences of our volunteers.” Feedback is now being sought on the
Strategy consultation document. SSSI wants to know if: • it is moving in the right direction • the goals and objectives reflect industry members’ aspirations • industry members support the underpinning principles • individual respondents would like to be involved Contributions are invited from all interested organisations and individuals, with the closing date for submissions being 31 August 2022. Submissions can be made online (https://forms.office.com/r/ DTyQsS7XJH) or can be sent to info@sssi. org.au. n
year of the career
She Maps unveils geospatial education model
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The Partnering for Purpose Model aims to inspire a new generation of surveying and geospatial experts.
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he Maps, a national education provider, says it is spearheading a solution to the surveying and spatial workforce skills shortage in Australia — a contributing factor to the current construction industry crisis. Founded by Paul Mead and Dr Karen Joyce in 2017, She Maps works with schools, teachers and parents to promote drone and geospatial skills development and career awareness programs. “There is a looming crisis in the construction industry, but She Maps is already ahead of the curve by running our programs in primary and secondary schools for several years,” said Mead. “The aim of our programs is to capture the hearts and minds of students by demonstrating the power of drones and potential career pathways.” As part of the solution, She Maps has unveiled its Partnering for Purpose Model, a multi-pronged approach that aims to inspire a new generation of surveying and geospatial experts. The model is in line with a recent report published by The Surveyors’ Trust, which highlights the need for urgent action due to the current and emerging shortage of skills across the geospatial industry. It has been reported by the Surveyors
Board Queensland that Queensland alone is set to lose 30% of its cadastral surveyors over the next five years, which will directly impact the delivery of critical infrastructure and construction projects over the coming decade. “Workforce shortages for surveying and spatial-related occupations have been looming for over a decade, and unless action is taken by the industry, the growing shortfall will continue unabated,” said Connection Point Consulting Director and the report’s author, Danika Bakalich. “It is plausible that had a coordinated, structured plan been implemented at the time of the earlier workforce analysis, the current situation may have been avoided.” To encourage sustainable supply to meet demand, it has been recognised that there needs to be more promotion of the industry, particularly within the secondary education sector. “Career ambitions have been primarily shaped by family, friends and the media, and they often have very clear ideas about ‘what they want to be’ when they get older,” said Mead. “At She Maps, we are passionate about the geospatial industry, but career options in the geospatial industry are invisible to the large majority of students.”
She Maps has been partnering with The Surveyors’ Trust since 2019, building the Partnering for Purpose Model with schools and the geospatial industry in Queensland. “Our new Partnering for Purpose Model has three zones of partnership that we need to build in order to have a strong and sustainable model for engagement from early primary school through to entry into the industry,” said Mead. “Ensuring diverse role models from the geospatial industry are engaged in schools from an early age is a critical part of supporting students’ confidence in trying new things, and we call this the Confidence Zone. “Supporting teacher ability is essential, and we call this the Capability Zone,” he added. The Connection Zone involves surveying days, career fairs, school visits, and work experience weeks. A study released in 2016 found that 40% of Australian teachers who teach geography have no formal training in the subject. “We need to be better at supporting the teachers that can have an impact on these students earlier,” said Mead. “As with raising a child, it takes a village,” said Mr Mead. “To create the next generation of geospatial professionals, it takes us all.” n www.spatialsource.com.au 31
disaster response
Shining a spotlight on bushfires JONATHAN NALLY
The Digital Earth Australia Hotspots program uses near-real-time satellite imagery to detect and monitor bushfires.
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n a nation as vast as Australia, natural disasters of one kind or another are almost a monthly occurrence — floods, cyclones and bushfires. Our country has seen many devastating examples of the latter in the past couple of decades, and the problem large-scale bushfires is only going to become worse as global warming really begins to bite. It is in the hope of improving emergency services’ bushfire response that the Digital Earth Australia Hotspots system (https:// hotspots.dea.ga.gov.au/) came into being. Born out of a collaboration between three government agencies, it was established in response to the devastating fires that swept through New South Wales and ACT in 2001, when it was identified that a system to detect and monitor bushfires was needed. To find out more about the worldleading program, we spoke with Maggie Arnold, Project Manager within the Operations team in the National Earth and Marine Observations Branch at Geoscience Australia. Arnold is responsible for delivering and maintaining the organisation’s mission critical applications, such as Digital Earth Australia Hotspots, and managing data production pipelines and delivery for marine data.
How did the project originate?
The original system, Sentinel Hotspots, was developed jointly by CSIRO, the Defence 32 position June/July 2022
Imagery and Geospatial Organisation and Geoscience Australia (GA) in 2002. Geoscience Australia began operating the national Hotspots service in 2005. GA partners with Landgate, Western Australia’s land information authority, to share, display and archive hotspots information. The service was renamed as Digital Earth Australia (DEA) Hotspots in 2019. GA also works with the Bureau of Meteorology to access data from the Japanese Meteorological Agency’s Himawari-8 satellite to produce 10-minute Hotspot updates and near-real-time (NRT) imagery. DEA Hotspots also includes DEA’s NRT Analysis Ready Data (ARD) imagery, which is derived from the European Commission’s Sentinel 2A and B, which updates every 4 to 5 days.
Who uses the system?
A diverse group of emergency management professionals access data from the system, including responders and managers, as well as researchers and the general public. They use DEA Hotspots data and web services as operational data feeds to inform situational awareness and monitor and manage assets, such as electrical infrastructure, transmission lines, and validate hotspots against other sources of data, for example, lightning strikes. User agencies include NSW Rural Fire Service, Emergency Services ACT, Department of Environment, Land, Water
and Planning (Victoria), NSW Emergency Information Coordination Unit, NSW Volunteer fire brigade, National Aerial Firefighting Centre, ACT Parks and Conservation Service, South Australian Country Fire Services, Northern Australian Fire Information, and private industry.
Has there been much development of the system over the years?
DEA Hotspots has developed from a system based on dial-up and broadband technology, to one of the first exemplar cloud-based mission-critical systems at GA with almost 100% uptime, scalability, reliability and availability. DEA Hotspots allows for the deployment of services across multiple availability zones, and system deployment and auto-scaling processes that allow new instances of the system to be deployed within minutes at times of increased user demand. There is redundancy built into the system that ensures there is minimal down time for the user. This is especially important during disaster response when large numbers of users access the system causing peak loads. During peak times of use, emergency managers can log in to a secure site, isolated from the public site, ensuring they have continued access. Over the years, the range of sensors that provide hotspots algorithms has increased, from AVHRR and MODIS to VIIRS and
A false colour image taken by the Sentinel 2B satellite of the Orroral Valley fire in the ACT in February 2020. The fire destroyed 80% of Namadgi National Park. Credit: Geoscience Australia.
During the Black Summer bushfires, DEA Hotspots was used by emergency managers to help identify and monitor potential fire locations. Himawari-8 sensors. Himawari-8 Hotspots was quite a game changer, as it provides data every 10 minutes to our users, which is about 144 updates per day… versus low earth orbit satellites, which may provide 4 to 10 updates per day, depending on where you are in Australia. GA is always looking for new sources of data and improved algorithms, working with the Bushfire and Natural Hazards Cooperative Research Centre and RMIT to implement near-real time Hotspot detection and processing capabilities. It also investigates sources of data, including the Sentinel 3 Sea and Land Surface Temperature Radiometer instrument from the European Commission. The data is meant for all of Australia to use, and the algorithms used aren’t specific to one state. The algorithms developed from Landgate have been modified to specifically suit Australian conditions, whereas some of the algorithms sourced from NASA and the University of Maryland have been developed to suit global conditions.
How much impact has the Hotspots system had?
During the Black Summer bushfires, DEA Hotspots was used by emergency managers to help identify and monitor potential fire locations that posed a possible risk to communities, properties and electrical infrastructure. With the addition of Himawari-8 Hotspots we can now detect potential new bushfires within 17 minutes of the satellite overpass. Since the Himawari-8 satellite is geostationary, it’s continuously collecting data every 10 minutes over the same area. Robyn Favelle from the NSW Rural Fire Service found the service to be a complementary source of information, saying “We really relied on the Hotspot data because sometimes we didn’t know the fire was there for hours. There was no one close to it.” The service has also been used by agencies such as the National Aerial Firefighting Centre to allocate resources and by the Department for Energy and Mining in South Australia to monitor electricity infrastructure.
Does cloud cover or smoke affect the system?
The system is only as good as the data it gets, so if there is heavy cloud, smoke or tree canopies that the sensor can’t see through, we do get errors of omission; that is, we don’t detect a hotspot. Hotspots are potential fires, but can also indicate other phenomena, such as gas flares, heavy industrial complexes and jet contrails. It can potentially detect areas of intense heat that could presage fires, as long as the area is large enough, hot enough, and also dependent on whether a satellite was overhead at the time.
Does the system have any restrictions?
Having access to a range of information and Earth observation data is essential for our emergency services. The hotspots information is an important piece of the puzzle, helping our emergency services understand where potential active fires are burning on a broader scale than if we just had eyes on the ground. At this stage our hotspot information updates every 10 minutes and is typically available to users within 17 minutes of the satellite overpass. There is some processing time required to acquire, clean and process the data. We are continually
Maggie Arnold, Geoscience Australia, is responsible for delivering and maintaining the organisation’s mission critical applications, such as Digital Earth Australia Hotspots.
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disaster response
Hotspot information updates every 10 minutes and is typically available to users within 17 minutes of the satellite overpass.
looking for ways to improve the system and hope to reduce this lag time by reviewing the backend processes and speed at which the hotspots are processed, and by incorporating other sources of hotspots. It is important to remember DEA Hotspots is not published in real time and should not be used for safety-of-life decisions. We know there are limitations to detecting hotspots from satellite sensors and I encourage everyone to read the safety message on the DEA Hotspots website and the Product Description.
Are there any other developments in the pipeline? We are hoping to incorporate other sources of hotspots into the system in collaboration with our partner research institutions. While no major development is on the cards, we’re aiming to make small incremental back-end changes over the next few months to help improve the system.
Hotspots over Canberra and Namadji National Park during the Black Summer bushfires 31 January 2020. The colour of the Hotspots represents the time the hotspot was last observed by a passing satellite and does not indicate severity. Credit: Geoscience Australia.
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Additionally, we are seeking to develop open-source tools to validate new hotspots from different sources. This will provide a robust process that will enable us to calculate relative performance of hotspot sources to determine whether they are fit for inclusion in DEA Hotspots.
Will data from the recently launched Landsat 9 be incorporated?
As we currently do for Sentinel 2, DEA will seek to incorporate NRT feeds of our Digital Earth Australia ARD products from Landsat 8 and 9 in the near future. These datasets provide high-resolution images that can more precisely define the extent of bushfires.
Are there comparable systems in use overseas?
Some of our algorithms are directly sourced from the NASA Direct Readout Laboratory
and processed by the Computing Facility at the University of Maryland. There are comparable systems in use overseas such as SiPongi+, Worldview and the European Forest Fire Information System, to name a few. Downlinking satellite data in Australia through the Australian National Ground Station Technical Team provides DEA Hotspots a timeliness advantage over similar systems, which can be delayed by relay of the satellite data through ground stations located outside Australia. DEA Hotspots is one of many sources of information for emergency managers and combines many sources of data. It is cloud computing-based, so it is reliable, scalable and has high availability for our users, provided they have an internet connection. n The DEA Hotspots program welcomes feedback and questions, and can be contacted at earth.observation@ga.gov.au.
The National Aerial Firefighting Centre integrated DEA Hotspots data into its dashboard Arena to help direct aircraft carrying water and fire retardant to the fire front. Credit: National Aerial Firefighting Centre.
partner feature
Spatial’s rising role in public asset management LYN TERRETT
The efficient delivery of services while using fewer resources will require an ever-evolving geospatial ecosystem.
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hich should come first when supporting our critical infrastructure — digital twins, AI or data integrity? And where should we place our focus when supporting smart city management? Funding to address the evolving challenges of our expanding dynamic urban landscapes alongside climate-related disasters, is tight. Infrastructure in Australia is valued at around $550 billion, and it is estimated that $20 million (or $800,000 per hour) is spent each day on asset management and maintenance activities. That’s why the integration of geospatial data and technologies such as digital twins, AI, machine learning, the IoT and 5G will enable us to form collaborative partnerships for a sustainable future, while making the most of limited financial resources. At the recent International Public Works Conference (IPWC) in Adelaide, delegates (largely local government and utility engineers) sought insights into how to be more effective at asset management. IPWC streams covered topics such as managing the environment and climate change, asset management, roads and pavements, and a special section called ‘Good Stuff,’ which was a catchall for several innovative presentations covering smart technologies largely underpinned by spatial data and map-centric visualisations. What was obvious was how important every aspect of the spatial Industry and
our highly skilled practitioners are in empowering real innovation in public works. Our role is to provide the locationbased data needed for service-level priorities to drive the best allocation of funding and resources, and so that assets such as roads, bridges, buildings and stormwater networks will have longer, more useful lives. There was also an overwhelming interest in using digital twins, AI and machine learning to overcome the shortage of civil engineers and public works asset management practitioners. Having undertaken research in AI feature extraction — from the rapid collection of spatial data using different sensors combined with advanced GNSS and IMU technologies — it is very clear that behind every future effective asset manager will be a digital inspector based on AI technology. AI and machine learning IPWC presentations were largely directed toward rapidly identifying defects, such as using imagery and other sensors to spatially find and identify such defects along roadways and from CCTV along drainage and wastewater pipes. Digital twins and digital cities will need systematic integration of geospatial technologies with dynamic inputs to enable effective decision making by stakeholders, and to automate workflows to serve, protect and provide liveable cities and sustainable environments.
But how will the spatial community address the gaps and communicate the value proposition of geospatial knowledge as the centrepiece for collaborative partnerships? And how will it facilitate the transfer of responsibilities across organisations and people to manage the infrastructure and environment, when the problems are due to the lack of data integrity? The NBN rollout and light rail projects in Sydney are stellar examples of what happens when the underlying design and construction data is old and out of date. From our experience at RapidMap, the possibilities are endless — developing 360° mobile camera capture to create personalised road corridor street views for road authorities, local government and road maintenance contractors with UI measuring tools; spatial data measurement and attribute capture, feature extraction, building classification engines using all the above frontier technologies; and an emphasis on PNT, quality sensors and highresolution imagery. The more efficient delivery of services across the nation while using fewer resources will require an ever-evolving geospatial knowledge ecosystem… and it highlights the need for Australia to develop smart communities of business and government experts who work in partnership. Fortunately, just as the IPWC event supports public works engineers, we have SSSI and SIBA|GITA to promote geospatial knowledge collaboration in affordably extending the lifespans of infrastructure — through proactive maintenance via digital twins, AI and sensors — rather than having to deal with massive replacement costs in the future. So, what is the priority from my perspective? Data integrity with positional accuracy. It might cost more to capture data the right way, but it is a better investment in the long run. n Lyn Terrett is Spatial Technologies Director at RapidMap and Iconyx.
AI is being used to assess road scans to spot areas where the asphalt has cracked (blue rectangles).
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interview
The sky isn’t the limit WA-based Global Drone Solutions has grown rapidly to become a leading drone training organisation.
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lobal Drone Solutions, a new SSSI Sustaining Partner, has been around for only a little over five years and yet is already a vendor for tier one companies such as BHP, Rio Tinto, Fortescue Metals Group, Newmont, Newcrest, Woodside, Chevron, Shell and Ausdrill, as well as many government entities. We spoke with the company’s founder, Mahmood Hussein, to find out the secret of its success.
The drone industry has now well and truly taken off; however, the untapped potential in the industry is enormous. A 2020 report by Deloitte Access Economics for the Australian Government forecast that the drone industry will increase the GDP of the Australian economy by $636 million in 2025, $2.036 billion in 2030 and $3.066 billion in 2040. The value of the Australian drone industry will grow from $78 million in 2020 to $5.5 billion in 2030 and $14.5 billion in 2040. POS: How are you keeping up with the industry’s evolution? MH: GDS has broadened its range of
Mahmood Hussein, founder,Global Drone Solutions
POS: How did the company get started? Mahmood Hussein: I founded Global
Drone Solutions (GDS) in January 2016, when the drone industry was in its infancy, particularly in Western Australia. My market research in 2015 showed that the mining industry was starting to use drones in its operations; so, if individuals wanted to join the mining industry, then having a drone pilot licence was going to be a distinct advantage. So I initially targeted this demographic, and, since establishing the drone pilot training academy in 2016, GDS has trained more than 3,000 pilots. 36 position June/July 2022
training to include terrestrial and sub-sea remotely operated vehicles. In late 2021, we won a large WA Government tender to develop training material for LNG process operators. This was a big step for GDS; it is going to contribute to significant growth for the business as we broaden our training reach. As we began work on the LNG training units, we realised that current training methods are outdated and can be vastly improved using technologies such as AI, augmented reality and virtual reality (VR). In response, we began work on developing a training metaverse, a unique 3-D virtual world, which students will enter using VR headsets. In the virtual world the trainee will be immersed in a digital twin of their future work environment, where they can safely interact with equipment and familiarise themselves before they get to site. The trainer will be able to guide them through any process and explain the right techniques for conducting work, isolations, hazards, dealing with simulated emergencies, and even pull components apart to explain how equipment works. To
JONATHAN NALLY
create the virtual training environment, we will capture data from the client’s physical plant, usually by drone, and develop a digital twin of it. POS: What’s next for GDS? MH: GDS has been looking at new
opportunities to position itself as a unique, innovative and disrupting technology provider and leader in the development and delivery of training materials. The energy industry, and specifically the LNG industry, is expanding at a rapid rate due to its decarbonising effects. In other activities, I am a board member of Lord of the Trees, where I help to ensure compliant drone operations for the organisation’s reforestation projects in Western Australia and Saudi Arabia. The organisation has developed a mass treeplanting method that uses drones to mimic the way nature distributes seeds. GDS also has a partnership with global humanitarian group WeRobotics, which uses technology to help tackle global issues such as inequality, social injustice and unsustainable development. GDS donates the use of its online training program. In the past 12 months, we have trained pilots in Africa, Latin America, the Indian SubContinent, Asia and the Pacific. POS: To what do you attribute your company’s success? MH: It’s really very simple — deliver
more value than you promise and ensure the client has a friendly and professional experience from the first call, right through to graduation and beyond. My purpose is to help others find a career that gives them pleasure as well as an income, provide them with opportunities for growth and generally make a positive contribution to society. n
new products AI-enhanced mobile mapping solution Leica Geosystems has announced the Leica Pegasus TRK500/700 Neo Mobile Mapping solution. The Pegasus TRK Neo solution brings autonomy, intelligence and simplicity to mobile mapping and has what the company describes as next-generation AIenhanced capabilities for mobile mapping. The dynamic laser scanning and expandable imagery system for recording, measuring and visualising environments is adaptable to a multitude of applications, increasing productivity with automated, intelligent workflows. The unit represents Leica Geosystems’ first artificial intelligence enhanced camera in a vehicle-based mobile mapping system (MMS) with builtin automatic camera calibration. For privacy compliance, its AI can identify and optionally blur objects, people and vehicles in real-time as data is collected. The Pegasus TRK Neo can be operated by one person and is suitable for users that are new to the technology as well as those with advanced technical expertise in various industries, including surveying, transportation and utilities.
3D machine control Topcon Positioning Group has announced a new option for Caterpillar Next Gen excavator users to leverage Topcon 3D machine control functionality together with Cat Assist features. As a result of new compatibility of the Topcon 3D Excavator System with Caterpillar factory installed NGH sensors, customers will experience simplified installation of the Topcon aftermarket system into Caterpillar’s existing 2D excavator systems, in coordination with Topcon and Caterpillar dealers. The Topcon system (distributed in Australia by Position Partners) is designed to provide real-time, dynamic, on-screen bucket location and design views, resulting in the operator cutting grade faster and more accurately. The operator can create, cut and check designs directly from the cab. Together with Caterpillar boom and bucket automation, operators can deliver quality work all day long with less fatigue. Position Partners has integrated Topcon machine control on hundreds of Caterpillar machines over the years, including the new Next Gen models. The added compatibility of the Topcon solution and the Cat Assist features will mean even more productivity and an enhanced experience for operators.
Dual-frequency GNSS receiver module Trimble has introduced the BD9250, a dual-frequency OEM GNSS receiver module designed to deliver high-accuracy positioning for a range of high volume, autonomousready applications used in the agriculture, construction, robotics and logistics industries. Equipped with Trimble’s ProPoint positioning engine, the BD9250 receiver is compatible with Trimble RTX correction services or RTK and supports all major GNSS constellations, including GPS, Galileo, GLONASS, BeiDou, QZSS and NavIC. Support for the Indian NavIC S-Band signal is also available with the BD9250s version. The receivers enable system integrators to choose either the L2 or L5 frequency to optimise signal performance and maximise the number of measurements available to the GNSS engine. Trimble says the BD9250 provides centimetre-level RTX accuracy without the need for a base station, making it suitable for applications that require precise positioning, without sacrificing accuracy, availability or integrity. www.spatialsource.com.au 37
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News and views from the Surveying and Spatial Sciences Institute
O SSSI Board Paul Digney President Dr Lesley Arnold President-Elect & Director – WA Wayne Patterson Director – NSW Peter James Director – Qld Nicholas Brown Director – ACT Michael Grear Director – SA Neil Hewitt Director – HC Andrej Mocicka Director – Vic Inga Playle Director – Tas Dr Zaffar Sadiq Mohamed-Ghouse Company Secretary Donny Darmawan YP Observer
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ver the past few months, SSSI has presented the case to our members and the wider sector for the need to form a peak body which represents both professionals and businesses in the surveying and spatial sector. At the end of May, an Extraordinary General Meeting (EGM) was held and SSSI members voted on several resolutions which, in essence, give the SSSI Board and Executive members’ consent to explore the option of merging with SIBA|GITA. It was with overwhelming support that SSSI members voted for the SSSI Board and Executive (in principle) to work towards a merger with SIBA|GITA. This is just the first step. We have adequately provided the case as to why merging both entities is a positive step forward for members and the surveying and spatial sector. Plus, we have highlighted some of the activities a peak organisation will focus on. Now it is time we get into the detail. Over the coming months, we will be finalising details about the structure of the proposed peak body, a membership model, the Governance framework, budgets and — most importantly — a comprehensive operations and business plan. We want our members to be well informed as to what the peak organisation will look like and champion, where they fit in the new organisation and to recognise the value of being part of it. Our priority is to ensure that the new organisation will continue to help our members achieve their career goals as well as nurture an innovative surveying and spatial sector. Financial SSSI and SIBA|GITA members will vote towards the end of the year to finalise the merger of both organisations to form a peak surveying and spatial body. The positive vote at the EGM plus my recent engagements with members at Locate22 has renewed my enthusiasm in progressing this merger. But we must make sure it is done right.
President’s Column The Surveyors Trust recently commissioned a report prepared by Danika Bakalich — The Australian Surveying and Spatial Workforce – A National Roadmap — which has once again reinforced the need for us to work with the sector to address the serious capability and capacity issues which are plaguing our sector. SSSI welcomes this report and agrees with its observations and supports the approach needed to address the problems. It further strengthens our resolve with regards to reform of the Institute with a stronger focus on workforce development, and aligns strongly with our overarching purpose to build a vital, diverse and thriving geospatial community. This report has provided great insights into the challenges our sector has in building a sustainable national workforce to meet growing demand. It provides a set of clear actions that form a whole of sector workforce roadmap that clearly sets out how to increase the supply of skills into the workforce. A range of systemic issues were identified which needed to be addressed to change the perspective and ways skills are recognised. These varied from lack of national standards; education and training not keeping pace with current and emerging technology; lack of impactful advocacy and awareness of the sector more broadly; fragmented sector representation; and previous programs having lost momentum due to funding issues and or lack of ownership. SSSI fully supports the five recommendations put forward to ensure we have a stronger pipeline of skilled professionals. These include: 1. Creation of a national taskforce to shape workforce development programs 2. Conduct biennial comprehensive environmental scans 3. Development of a national competency framework for all relevant disciplines across the workforce
Commission Chairs Engineering & Mining Surveying Chair Andrew Barkham chair.emsc@sssi.org.au Hydrography Commission Chair Neil Hewitt chair.hc@sssi.org.au Land Surveying Commission Chair Lee Hellen chair.lsc@sssi.org.au Remote Sensing & Photogrammetry Commission Chair Dr Petra Helmholz chair.rspc@sssi.org.au
4. Development of a taxonomy of occupations and incorporation into ANZCO and industry defined occupations 5. Development of a national skills and career pathway. SSSI has an integral role to play in leading and supporting these recommendations. The establishment of a national workforce taskforce that shapes workforce development programs and provides an opportunity for national industry bodies and intergovernmental organisations to engage their membershipbase, to develop workforce strategies and report against them, is a critically important element of the workforce roadmap. SSSI is keen to lead establishment of the national taskforce. We have a well-connected professional network to call upon to co-design development programs and to develop and support the implementation of plausible solutions. We also strongly advocate for the development of a national competency framework that represents competencies across the whole workforce. Within the geospatial sector there is an absence of national standards for all disciplines and poor uptake of certification and microcredentialling for practitioners needing specific in-demand skills. This is a critical gap that needs to be immediately addressed. In summary, the paper clearly identifies that workforce shortages for the surveying and spatial occupations have been looming for over a decade and, unless action is taken by the industry, the growing shortfall will continue unabated. If the geospatial sector is to be recognised as a mature professional industry vitally important to the nation, then we need to leverage national efforts to improve the quality of training and education. Increasing the supply of talent is an immediate priority. Ensuring the sector has in place, agreed positions around the recognition of skills and an industry-led
provision of training and education, is not just vitally important… it is the only option. It really is an exciting time for our sector and we look forward to working with our members to capitalise on the growth opportunities. Finally, I do hope you were able to attend Locate22 this year. To me, Locate22 is always about the people you meet and reconnect with. This year it was great to see so many familiar faces, but also many new ones. It is hard to believe it has been over two years since we have all been able to meet in person. Something I will not take for granted again. It was also great to hear about the new developments in research and technology. The contributions our sectors make to other sectors is phenomenal. We need to keep sharing these stories. At Locate22, SSSI was very pleased to launch the Surveying and Spatial Volunteer Strategy drafted by our Disaster Manager & Recovery Special Interest Group (DMRSIG). The strategy offers a clear vision founded on the principles of resilience building underpinned by the knowledge of where. It enables our volunteer program to continue to grow and deliver increased value to the community. It provides a much clearer pathway for people to get involved and active, and it also proposes a framework which brings greater coordination both within the organisation and the many external stakeholder groups. I congratulate the DMR-SIG for this work. Finally, I would like to congratulate all the individual and business winners for the 2021 Asia-Pacific Spatial Excellence Awards (APSEAs). Once again, we are overwhelmed with talent in this sector and this has been our chance to showcase just some of our high achievers. I congratulate all the state finalists and winners. Stay safe. Paul Digney President
Spatial Information & Cartography Commission Chair
Robert Campbell chair.sicc@sssi.org.au
Regional Committee Chairs ACT Regional Chair Noel Ward chair.act@sssi.org.au NSW Regional Chair Roshni Sharma chair.nsw@sssi.org.au NT Regional Chair Rob Sarib chair.nt@sssi.org.au QLD Regional Chair Noel Davidson chair.qld@sssi.org.au SA Regional Chair Graham Walker chair.sa@sssi.org.au TAS Regional Chair
Inga Playle chair.tas@sssi.org.au VIC Regional Chair Richard Syme chair.vic@sssi.org.au WA Regional Chair Darren Mottolini chair.wa@sssi.org.au SSSI National Office 27-29 Napier Cl, Deakin, ACT 2600 (PO Box 307) Phone: +61 2 6282 2282 Email: info@sssi.org.au
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APSEA 2021 Oceanic Individual recipients
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ongratulations to the following recipients of the 2021 Asia Pacific Spatial Excellence Awards – Oceanic Individual Awards, which celebrate individuals who have made significant contributions within the surveying and spatial sector.
Professional of the Year (Winner): Kellie Dean (Vic) Kellie is Regional Manager for Victoria & Tasmania at Veris. She is one of only 16 female licensed surveyors practicing in Victoria and was the first woman to become the President of the Institution of Surveyors Victoria. She has used her positions to progress the profession towards better gender balance and diversity, including in her role as a convenor of the Space, Spatial and Surveying Diversity Leaders Network (SSS-DLN). Professional of the Year (Highly Commended): Stuart Caie (NZ) Stuart has demonstrated strong technical expertise and leadership and is a wellrespected surveying professional within both the national and international hydrographic community. He is currently responsible for managing New Zealand’s multimillion-dollar hydrographic survey programme at the New Zealand Hydrographic Authority. His leadership is demonstrated by the successful delivery of a multi-year project to improve navigation and hydrographic capability in the Pacific Region. Future Leader of the Year Award: Jennifer Brindle (SA) Jennifer is a Certified Professional Hydrographic Surveyor Level 1, the highest standard of certification awarded by the AHSCP, and is currently Operations
Manager at Precision Hydrographic Surveying. Her knowledge, ability to lead a team of surveyors, mentoring skills and encouragement of junior team members, all make her a well-respected and valued team member. She is also heavily involved in SSSI through a number of committee and volunteer roles. Diversity & Inclusion Award: Andrew Dowding (WA) Andrew is a Ngarluma man whose family is from the West Pilbara. His passion is community facilitated mapping projects that digitally capture Aboriginal knowledge for future generations. He is the founder and Managing Director of Winyama, a WAbased indigenous-owned and -operated business that aims to empower indigenous communities through digital and location technologies. Educational Development Award: Zahra Gharineiat (Qld) Zahra has contributed to the profession through teaching, engagement activities and research that transfers, engages and enhances knowledge, skills and awareness. She has demonstrated innovative teaching, obtained significant research funding, published research articles in top-ranked journals, and established the successful ‘Drones for STEM learning & teaching’ project, which received the 2019 USQ Excellence Award for Community Engagement and Service.
SPECIAL AWARDS At May’s APSEA ceremony, two special awards were announced: the President’s Award to Amelia Davies and the Eminence Award to Greg Scott. Amelia, currently the Director of Location Capability at the Australian Bureau of Statistics, champions diversity and inclusive workplaces through her role as Chair of the Space, Spatial and Surveying Diversity Leadership Network. She understands that everyone has a voice and should be given equal opportunity to be heard. Greg is the Inter-regional Advisor for the United Nations Statistics Division, which he joined in early 2012 with the specific task of establishing the United Nations Committee of Experts on Global Geospatial Information Management and growing its role and relevance with member states and related international organisations. Prior to joining the UN, he spent 25 years in several key roles within Geoscience Australia. 40 position June/July 2022
NEW AWARD FOR 2022 In honour of Bruce Thompson, who passed away last year, the new Bruce Thompson Award will recognise an individual who demonstrates innovation, enthusiasm and commitment that has had a positive impact on the spatial sector and industry. The recipient will be a creative thinker who has generated a new idea to address issues and improve the use and adoption of spatial information technologies. Nominations will be welcomed from across the public and private sector.
Postgraduate Student Award: Amelie Jeanneau (SA) Amelie recently completed her PhD with the Spatial Information Group at the University of Adelaide, with a Dean’s Commendation for Doctoral Thesis Excellence. The Spatial Decision Support Tool developed as part of her thesis enables land managers and policymakers to identify soil erosion risk from wind and water to protect and improve soils. Her work is internationally acclaimed. Undergraduate Student Award: Pearl Ontse (WA) Pearl has demonstrated outstanding abilities way beyond Bachelor’s level, conducting high-quality research through employment of new Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) modelling techniques and many tests and applications of GRACE satellite data. Her theoretical and practical skills in surveying, and particularly in statistics, enabled her to quickly absorb theories and methodologies to a level that allowed her to process GRACE data. Vocational Education Training Award: Jason Hanckel (NSW) Jason has completed a Diploma of Surveying studies via blended delivery. With more than 20 years’ experience in the profession, he dedicated time and effort to gain his qualification while working full-time with WW Surveys on the Pacific Highway upgrade. His commitment was outstanding, with assignments submitted on time and prepared to high standard. In the next issue of Position Magazine, we will profile the Oceanic recipients of the APSEA Business Awards. And don’t forget that applications are now open for the 2022 awards — for all the details, visit www.apsea.org.au.
Vale
Will Featherstone, 1967–2022 NIGEL PENNA and JON KIRBY
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rofessor Will E. Featherstone passed away on 13 May 2022 in Perth at the age of 54 after a short illness. Born in north-western England in 1967, Will grew up and attended school in Prestatyn, Wales, before studying for a BSc in geophysics and planetary sciences at the University of Newcastle upon Tyne from 1985 to 1988. He then studied at the University of Oxford from 1988 to 1992, from which he obtained a DPhil for his thesis entitled ‘A GPS controlled gravimetric determination of the geoid of the British Isles,’ under the supervision of Dr Joe Olliver, who was to become a lifelong friend and mentor. Will took an academic post at Curtin University in Perth, Australia, in 1992, where he remained for the rest of his life, very quickly progressing through the academic ranks to become full professor in 2001 aged only 33. His drive, enthusiasm and hard work was fundamental to the initiation and building from scratch of a major geodetic research group at Curtin, particularly in physical geodesy, and attracting new staff, research students and visiting researchers from all over the world. Will greatly enjoyed travel and the opportunity to learn from and work with international researchers, which included lengthy research visits to the universities of Calgary and New Brunswick in 1996, an Alexander von Humboldt Fellowship at the University of Stuttgart for most of 2006, and to the Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur, in 2019. Will’s primary research area was physical geodesy, especially geoid determination and vertical datums. A particular impact of his research was his leadership of three computations of the Australian geoid (AUSGeoid98, AUSGeoid09 and AUSGeoid2020), adopted by AUSLIG/ Geoscience Australia for the free provision of orthometric heights for end users throughout Australia. He also supervised the computation of the 2009 New Zealand geoid model. Whilst maintaining his primary research focus on physical geodesy — including the award of a five-year Australian Research Council Professorial Fellowship to work on ellipsoidal physical geodesy — Will expanded his research interests to include
satellite altimetry, lunar gravity field modelling and basin identification, airborne gravimetry, and subsidence monitoring using InSAR, GPS and levelling. Most of his research was prestigiously funded by the Australian Research Council continuously for nearly 30 years. Will worked incredibly efficiently, able to write a substantial number of papers (particularly in the Journal of Geodesy) very quickly, aided by his vast awareness of the geodetic literature past and present. He would return drafts of work within a few days at most, always with many constructive suggestions for improvement, and ensured that his PhD students and research staff were properly mentored and able to obtain full credit for their work. Notably, as well as helping his colleagues and collaborators promptly and selflessly, Will devoted substantial amounts of his time to reviewing for funding bodies and almost all geodetic and geophysical journals, in particular serving the International Association of Geodesy (IAG) as Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Geodesy from 2003 to 2007, and as an editor from 1999 to 2003. His service to the IAG was recognised through the award of IAG Fellow. At Curtin, Will took on substantial administration and management duties, including Head of Department, Associate Dean for Research, Graduate Studies Coordinator, and member of both Academic Senate and Academic Board. His core teaching duties included running a popular residential fieldwork course in geodetic surveying at Guilderton, Western Australia. This ‘field camp’ ran for over 25 years for two to four weeks every September, and, it is fair to say, provided a ‘baptism by fire’ for most of Perth’s professional surveyors. Will was an excellent speaker and presenter, able to articulate complex problems and concepts simply and concisely. He was quick-witted, fun to work with, and incredibly trustworthy and loyal. He will be greatly missed by his friends, colleagues and the wider geodetic community. He leaves behind two adult children. n Dr Nigel Penna (Newcastle University, UK) and Associate Professor Jon Kirby (Curtin University). www.spatialsource.com.au 41
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In conversation with
Brittany Dahl B
rittany Dahl is an emerging leader and high achiever who received a Highly Commended in the Future Leader category of the NSW 2021 round of the Asia Pacific Spatial Excellence Awards. A Solutions Engineer in Geospatial, Earth Observation & Sustainability in the Canberra Office of NGIS, Dahl is part of the next generation of geospatial professionals who personify the digital transformation that is underway — tech savvy and driving the derivation of knowledge from data and merging the human, physical and digital environments. An expert in cloud applications, Earth observation information and GIS analysis for datadriven decision making, Dahl is passionate about maps, food systems and biodiversity. Outside of work she is a STEM coach working with two high schools, leads a team of 18 volunteers supporting NextGen innovators and entrepreneurs for scalable food and AgTech, and has been active as a speaker at SSSI events and is involved in several SSSI committees. SSSI CEO, Tony Wheeler, spoke with Dahl to find out what drives her to excel in her field.
TW: What excites you about geospatial technology? BD: I’m excited about the ability to drive
change. There’s nothing like changing a mindset, decision or action through a geospatial product. That moment when a lightbulb flashes behind someone’s eyes after viewing a map, and instantly realising how to better improve their workflow, business or policy. Yet, in practice this is usually a rare, idealised situation. The real world is always more complicated, and in most cases a map, dashboard or flashy dataset derived from satellite imagery is not enough to achieve significant change. I do believe, however, that there’s a strong argument to show that ‘seeing is believing’. Most people are visual learners. They want to understand a problem graphically, and second, comprehend its meaning into an evidence-based solution. Isn’t a map the easiest way to do this? After all, what better way to show someone the visual ‘ground truth’ than a map or satellite image? Hopefully this question awakens the critical thinkers, who, upon reading this, know all too well that geospatial products are never a perfect representation of the real world, while they dig out their third-edition copy of Mark Monmonier’s ‘How to Lie with Maps’. I’m not suggesting that our industry has all the answers, just that we can be impactful in conveying new knowledge, as justified and true beliefs, that can make a difference in everyday lives. TW: Where do you see geospatial really being impactful in the immediate and medium term? BD: I’ve personally seen the power of
geospatial technology time after time. From maps of fires and floods guiding my vehicle and others’ during times of crisis, to 42 position June/July 2022
even the simple, mundane, everyday tasks, like lunch delivered to my door through a trackable app. The growth in technology and mobile devices is leading to geospatial information becoming ubiquitous. Location intelligence and satellite imagery is now shared through all forms of media, from traditional news channels to TikToks! In the short term this is making it easier to apply our industry’s products to more people, and in the longer term, I hope this is better connecting people with the tools to transform our world for the good of us all. Climate change and long-term global sustainability are some of the most complex problems impacting every field — from education to mental health, environmental ecology to social justice — that we just aren’t adequately addressing. TW: Tell us about your interest in food production and biodiversity. BD: Food production and biodiversity has
always been a passion of mine, and I’ve been lucky enough to undertake several projects in this space. Since moving to NGIS I’ve been working with one of the world’s largest buyers of palm oil, Unilever, who have set a goal to have a deforestationfree supply chain by 2023. By combining the power of cloud computing with Earth observation data and automated processing, we are building a more holistic view of the forests, water cycles and biodiversity that intersect Unilever’s supply chain. The idea is to raise sustainable sourcing standards for suppliers in low-income countries and play a role in breaking the link between palm oil and future deforestation. Secondly, I’m a volunteer for World Wildlife Fund (WWF) Australia. I am currently a Curator for the Innovate to Regenerate Challenge, helping WWF
identify and review the most impactful regenerative projects for future support. WWF is deploying $2 million to support solutions that can reverse environmental damage and create a positive impact, including agricultural solutions that benefit both environment and community. WWF have already successfully launched Leaf Relief, utilising drones to drop 40,000 seeds per day to grow 2 billion trees in Australia by 2030. What a great use case for geospatial technology! TW: We’re seeing an increased focus on diversity and inclusion. How far have we come and what still needs to change? BD: Many geospatial organisations have
a long way to go to improve not only diversity and inclusion (D&I), but also social and cultural responsibilities. I’m lucky enough to be part of an organisation that values Indigenous voices, including a fully run and owned Indigenous part of the business, called Winyama. However, luck should have nothing to do with this issue. Sadly, the problem is abundant in the wider technology industry, not just geospatial. One group to keep a close eye on is SSSDLN, which is providing visible advocacy for D&I in our industry, including the ‘Inclusion@Work’ benchmarking survey. There are other small steps organisations can take, including valuing openness and transparency, knowledge sharing of wages, removal of gendered language, actively promoting equal opportunities for staff, and embracing diversity and interdisciplinarity in all business policies and procedures. The benefits are endless — engaging with a wider variety of people, topics, ideas and industries creates fertile ground for innovation and sustainable long-term business. n
Position magazine’s next three issues will give your company or organisation the focused opportunities it needs to promote your products and services to Australia’s most engaged audience of professionals and solution buyers. Don’t miss out — make sure you get involved.
©stock.adobe.com/au/Jackie Niam
©stock.adobe.com/au/jozsitoeroe
August issue — Technology
October issue — Climate change
Introducing our annual Technology issue! In August we will focus on the equipment, services and solutions that make the surveying and spatial sectors work. This is your chance to showcase your organisation’s latest offerings to a highly targeted market of peer professionals. Multiple options are available, from product announcements to interviews to case studies and more.
The surveying and spatial sectors play a vital role in the monitoring, measuring and response to global warming and climate change. If you’re involved in any aspect of this — from flood mapping to aerial imagery to digital twins — our Climate Change issue will be your chance to showcase your work and demonstrate your capabilities and offerings. A variety of marketing opportunities are available, from case studies to thought leadership and more. leaders forum
suppliers’ index SPATIAL SCIENTIFIC PTY. LTD.
SOKKIA Sokkia is a world-leading manufacturer of precision measuring systems. Sokkia’s diverse product line provides complete measurement solutions for surveying, mapping and GIS, industrial measurement and construction applications. Sokkia provides turnkey solutions for surveyors worldwide. Sokkia Corporation markets Total Stations, Data Collectors, Digital Levels, and a full complement of field accessories through a nationwide distribution network. 16900 W 118th Terrace Olathe KS 66061 ph: +1-800-4-SOKKIA web: http://www.sokkia.com
Spatial Scientific is the owner of the AeroScientific brand, a global leader in aerial camera control software (the Aviatrix flight management system) and FlightPlanner flight planning software. AeroScientific products are configured to work with large, medium and small format aerial cameras, mounted on both manned aircraft and UAVs. Spatial Scientific also provides remote sensing and airborne imaging solutions spanning a range of industries, such as agriculture, viticulture, and mining. PO Box 520 BLACKWOOD SA 5051 ph: 0405 141 647 em: info@aerosci.info web: http://www.aerosci.info
STEP GLOBAL Since 2006 we’ve been supporting our customers through the supply of technology leading products. Initially it was just the resell of Trimble Navigation OEM products. Over the years we have expanded our product range to include suppliers such as GPSSource, Harxon, PCTel, MobileMark, iBase, CalAmp. At the same time, we have expanded our engineering capability in order to provide bespoke system level solutions to our customers. Today Step Global has 3 distinct focuses. 1. Step Global Products Business This business focuses on the Value-Added Resale of a range of quality products from globally recognised manufacturers – see our Brands. 2. Step Global Solutions Business Step Global provides engineered solutions focused on the real time management of mobile assets. This includes full system architecture design through module integration and software development. We specialise in developing both hardware peripherals and software applications 3. Full System Solutions We research and then develop complete systems that are focused on capturing operational, safety and compliance events and then presenting any exceptions in real time to operators and supervisors. 1 Arco Lane HEATHERTON VIC 3202 ph: +61 3 9551 7334 em: sales@stepglobal.com web: http://stepglobal.com
SPATIAL VISION Spatial Vision is a leading specialist in information and spatial technologies. Integrating geographic and organisational data, we provide business systems, advanced spatial analyses, reliable planning systems and practical mapping applications to address some of the country’s most pressing environmental, economic and resource issues. Level 8 575 Bourke Street Melbourne VIC 3000 ph: 03 9691 3000 fax: 03 9691 3001 em: info@spatialvision.com.au web: http://www.spatialvision.com.au
SPATIALISED
SPATIAL INDUSTRIES BUSINESS ASSOCIATION LTD GEOSPATIAL INFO & TECHNOLOGY ASSOCIATION ANZ (SIBA|GITA) SIBA|GITA’s purpose is to foster an opportunity-rich environment for its members. SIBA|GITA represents the spatial industries collectively, and provides our members with a voice enabling business-related issues and activities that may be more expensive, difficult or impossible to do individually to be addressed: SIBA|GITA does this in three main streams of activities; Creating future demand, Creating a better business environment and Providing direct business support. 64 Sylvan Rd TOOWONG QLD 4066 fax: 07 3145 0130 em: info@spatialbusiness.org web: http://www.spatialbusiness.org
SPATIAL INTELLIGENCE Application developers, web developers and GIS consultants. Offering innovative solutions to meet client business requirements, and maintaining long term successful relationships through professional support and cost effectiveness. Developer of map enabled applications to provide powerful and efficient spatial business solutions. Suite 105 11 Chandos St ST LEONARDS NSW 2065 ph: 02 9438 4600 em: info@spatialintelligence.com.au web: http://www.spatialintelligence.com.au
SPATIAL JOBS ONLINE An online jobs notice board dedicated to the spatial industry, which covers professions such as land and hydrographic surveying, cartography, GIS, engineering and mining surveying, remote sensing and photogrammetry. PO Box 1700 NEWCASTLE NSW 2300 em: info@spatialjobs.com.au web: http://www.spatialjobs.com.au
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Spatialised is a consultancy with deep experience creating innovation in field research, data services, and business thinking. A technical background in science logistics, field data collection, airborne LIDAR and image analysis, massive data wrangling and earth systems science gives Spatialised an ability to develop ‘full stack’ projects – from planning observations to collecting data to delivering products. A deep involvement in the open geospatial community and open data standards (OGC) provides an ability to create and nurture collaborative communities. Collaboration-focussed, Spatialised has no competitors, only amazing people we haven’t worked with yet! PO Box 210 BENAMBRA VIC 3900 ph: 0427091712 em: adam@spatialised.net web: http://spatialised.net
SURDEVEL PTY LTD
SPECTERRA SERVICES The company’s primary focus is to design, develop and build optical instruments, processing systems and analysis tools for vegetation specific manned and unmanned airborne remote sensing projects. The output high resolution Digital Multi-Spectral Imagery is a powerful tool for mapping and monitoring vegetation status across intensive and extensive landscapes; working to improve the economic, agronomic, technical and environmental performance of landresource based projects. 4/643 Newcastle St LEEDERVILLE WA 6007 ph: 08 9227 9644 fax: 08 9227 9744 em: info@specterra.com.au web: http://www.specterra.com.au
SPECULAR PTY LTD Specular represent Phase One Industrial in Australia and consult and supply the worlds best medium format aerial camera systems. Suite 104 134 Cambridge Street Collingwood VIC 3066 ph: 03 9091 2111 em: info@specular.com.au web: http://www.specular.com.au
SurDevel is a Surveying and Project Management firm who are experts in all types of Land information and Survey services. Our work covers most of NSW. Our latest services include integrated land titling (including eplan) and coordinated land information systems and project management, as well as our standard survey services. We provide professional services that are unique and cutting edge, utilising the latest technologies and management systems. 137 King Street NEWCASTLE NSW 2300 ph: 02 4925 2556 em: survey@surdevel.com.au web: http://www.surdevel.com.au
SURVEY SOLUTIONS SURVEY SOLUTIONS supply a range of the latest GNSS receivers and 3D scanners. SOUTH GNSS has prices starting from A$9,000+GST. SOUTH is accurate and reliable with extensive reference sites all over NZ & Pacific. 3D scanners available include ARTEC, and GEOSLAM. Survey accessories can be ordered through our SHOPONLINE. Service, repair, training and technical support is available. We are surveyors with 25 years experience worldwide. Unit 3, 16 Curly McLeod Way, Mount Maunganui Hamilton 3175 ph: +64 7 262 2110 em: info@surveysolutions.co.nz web: http://www.surveysolutions.co.nz
“I think that Australia is at the forefront of the geospatial industry and we really do punch above our weight.”
SURVEYING & SPATIAL SCIENCES INSTITUTE (SSSI) The not-for-profit national body representing surveying and spatial science professionals from Australia, New Zealand and abroad. SSSI actively promotes and advances the surveying and spatial disciplines, representing professionals in: land surveying, spatial information and cartography, remote sensing and photogrammetry, hydrographic surveying, and engineering and mining surveying. 27-29 Napier Close DEAKIN ACT 2600 ph: 02 2628 2228 fax: 02 6282 2576 em: chris.malouf@sssi.org.au web: http://www.sssi.org.au
SURVEYING SA Want a profession that doesn’t box you in? Surveying and spatial science professionals work indoors and outdoors, travel the world using the latest technology and liaise with architects, engineers or developers - the variety is limitless. Lvl 7 West, Zurich House 50 Grenfell St Adelaide SA 5001 ph: 08 8212 0343 em: trysurveying@alifewithoutlimits.com.au web: http://www.alifewithoutlimits.com.au
SURVEYTEC SALES AND SERVICE Established 30 years as a surveying equipment supplier, Nikon dealer and responsible service centre. Offering a wide range of precise field measuring equipment. Manufacturer of specialised field accessories, small runs of custom made items to suit your work. Schonstedt Underground Locators, ranging from magnetic field locators to search for buried marks, critical to tie in field data, through to service locator systems in search of pipe or cables. Combined kits so you’re ready for all sites. 9 Dalmont St HIGHETT VIC 3190 ph: 0418 130 241 em: robert.vass@bigpond.com web: http://www.surveytec.com.au
TAYLORS Taylors have a team of over 160 professionals including town planners, urban designers, architects, landscape architects, civil engineers, licensed surveyors, field surveyors, draftspeople, project managers and development strategists. Having both Australian and international experience, our extensive network extends nationally through Victoria and Queensland, and to the Asia-Pacific region through New Zealand and Indonesia. We offer a unique integrated and seamless approach to consulting across four core businesses in Urban Development, Built Environments, Infrastructure and Engineering and Project Management. 8/270 Ferntree Gully Road NOTTING HILL VIC 3168 ph: 03 9501 2800 em: n.pendlebury@taylorsds.com.au web: http://www.taylorsds.com.au
TERRASCENE PTY LTD TerraScene 360 image capture provides control when compared to uncontrolled, ever-changing, public streetviews and image services www.spatialsource.com.au
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“Our wish is that industry, researchers and government come together on areas of common interest.”
Gemma Van Halderen (left) and Alison Rose
David Byrne
Gemma Van Halderen
David Byrne is Aerometrex’s Chief Operating Officer and a member of the Board, having joined in 2000 as Chief Photogrammetrist. He has been largely responsible for Aerometrex’s successful technical program and previously filled the role of Production Manager. Which technologies will revolutionise the surveying, space or spatial sectors in 2022? Virtual worlds are going to be truly revolutionary for the geospatial industry. We connect perfectly to the whole metaverse industry because our 3D models are hyper-accurate replications of the real world. Metaverse companies build on our base 3D datasets instead of designing a world from scratch. I think people like the idea of living and interacting in a virtual world based in reality. Everybody would love the opportunity to go to a place like Manhattan, but may not have the means to. We can capture and build so many fantastic places around the globe and I can see that happening more in the future. How can the industry play a role in the recovery from the COVID pandemic? COVID has taught us to live and conduct our lives more remotely. Aerometrex is operating with remote capture methods and dataas-a-service product delivery, which places us well to handle that. The MetroMap platform is ideal for remote work environments where people don’t have to be on-site, travelling and interacting with others. I also think we’ll be at the forefront of the wave of development that will happen in the post-pandemic rebuild. Whether that’s infrastructure, construction or building, our industry and our data play a big part in large-scale projects. How is Australasia placed in the global context? Are we racing ahead or falling behind? I think that Australia is at the forefront of the geospatial industry and we really do punch above our weight. Our 3D modelling products are where we see ourselves as a global leader. We’ve been invited to international projects, such as capturing the city of Philadelphia for the Pope’s visit and modelling the old city of Pau in France. Both clients wanted the best 3D model; and with basically anyone in the world to choose from, they sought us out here in Adelaide. It proves that we in Australia are capable of leading the world. What’s on your wish list for 2022? Changing how government and companies like us collaborate is always topical at Aerometrex. The important thing is to continue 18 position December/January 2021-22
Alison Rose Chief of GA’s Place, Space and Communities Division
Chief Operating Officer, Aerometrex
working together on a win-win situation where both parties come out on top. Sometimes it feels like governments are competing with a company like ours, creating their own programs of capturing data. That undermines what industries like ours are trying to do. That’s something we’ll keep talking to governments about, and we need to keep expressing what our worth is. Which challenges or opportunities should the industry be focused on? Access to more skilled professionals is an interesting challenge for us, and one that the whole industry is dealing with. Software developers will play a massive part in our business as the geospatial industry moves closer to a tech industry model, and software developers are highly sought after. Aerometrex is what we would consider an extremely multicultural business, and that’s partly because we’ve always been comfortable going abroad to find the talent we need. That’s been great for our business culture and building creativity and innovation. What do you think your customers are looking for in 2022? People want more, better and faster data. That’s where a product like MetroMap becomes so powerful because it enables scaling of data creation and delivery. Having many clients for the same data means that we can offer a much more attractive price. More broadly, we’re finding the thirst for data is ever-increasing, and has been since 2005 with Google Earth. Google Earth provided a desire for data that never stopped. What are your organisation’s priorities for 2022? We’re a public company now, and the company’s performance is under the magnifying glass. Balancing financial performance and positioning ourselves right for the future is our priority. We’ll continue investing in all business parts to make sure we stay ahead of the curve because that gives us the best chance to grow. More specifically, we’ll continue developing more exciting and diversified products and solutions, then find ways to integrate them into MetroMap. That will bring in added tools and use cases where people can get enhanced benefit from the same data. n
Lead, ABS Population, Labour and Location Insights Division Alison Rose is the Chief of Geoscience Australia’s (GA) Place, Space and Communities Division. Previously, she held senior executive positions within the private and public sectors. Gemma Van Halderen leads the Australian Bureau of Statistics’ (ABS) Population, Labour and Location Insights Division. A statistician, she has represented Australia at the UN Committee of Experts on Global Geospatial Information Management. Which technologies will revolutionise the surveying, space or spatial sectors in 2022? Alison Rose: I think AI will push new boundaries in the spatial and statistical sector. We are already seeing this with the use of digital twins. We are also seeing a step-change in the uptake of low-cost and accessible technologies based on precise positioning. Small satellites, unmanned aerial vehicles and advanced sensors are also having an impact. The IoT will accelerate the level of digital intelligence in the spatial sector. And, all of these new technologies will generate big data requiring multi-source/cross-domain data integration and analytics. We are also creating innovative ways to benefit from space, spatial and statistical data by making it findable, accessible, interoperable and reusable. How is Australasia placed in the global context? Are we racing ahead or falling behind?
Gemma Van Halderen: Globally, Australia
is well placed. Our willingness to innovate makes us recognised leaders in the adoption and application of new geospatial and statistical data technologies and in the development of new standards and methods. This is particularly apparent in the adoption of new positioning and Earth observation technology in agriculture and resources. An exciting development is the Australian Government’s Digital Economy Strategy, which will place Australia as a leading digital economy by 2030. ABS
and GA have a number of collaborative initiatives underway under this Strategy, most notably the Digital Atlas of Australia and the Australian Data Strategy. The Strategy will require industry input to be successful. What’s on your wish list for 2022? Alison Rose: Our wish is that industry, researchers and government come together on areas of common interest and invest in opportunities that integrate and enhance cooperation across the space and spatial and statistical sectors. Through collaboration, we’d like to see the linkages between upstream collection and downstream application drive our ability to respond to key challenges, such as the post-COVID-19 economic recovery and increased preparedness for natural disasters. For this to happen, it is imperative that we work together through the data supply chain, share data based on strong data quality standards and interoperability, and better connect spatial and non-spatial data into business systems. Which challenges or opportunities should the industry be focused on?
Gemma Van Halderen: The 2020 bushfires
and COVID-19 have driven the digital transformation of a wide range of services and provided a clear demonstration of the value of location-based, data-driven insights for decision making. We have an opportunity to capitalise on these changes and ensure geospatial and statistical capabilities are baked into recovery initiatives.
This will require data professionals to focus on collaborating with customers and across data communities, as well as clearly communicating the value we can deliver through geospatial information and technology. And we must look to develop well-rounded professionals with great communication and collaboration skills, alongside strong technical skills. What are your organisations’ priorities for 2022? Alison Rose/Gemma Van Halderen: In 2022, GA will be delivering on its Strategy 2028 through several programs such Positioning Australia, Digital Earth Australia and the initial release of the Digital Atlas of Australia, which will connect layers of data and enable users to visualise and analyse Australia’s large and complex geography like never before. The ABS will be delivering its ever-expanding suite of statistical products and services while reducing reporting burden on businesses and households. We will realise benefits from our Big Data, Timely Insights Program to use big data and digital sources for official statistics as well as lead and partner across the Australian Government to build the APS data profession, including expanding geospatial capabilities. GA and ABS work in close partnership. An immediate priority is the Australian Climate Service, a collaboration between GA, ABS, CSIRO and BoM that aims to improve understanding of the threats posed by a changing climate and natural hazards, to limit the impacts now and in the future. n www.spatialsource.com.au 19
December issue — Directory / Leaders Forum December is when we publish our annual Directory, Australia’s only comprehensive listing of organisations involved in the surveying and spatial field. Don’t miss out — make sure your organisation is included. Premium spots are available. The December issue will also feature our Leaders Forum. Introduced for the first time 2021, the well-received Q&A-style
Leaders Forum gives you the opportunity to position your organisation as a frontrunner in the surveying and spatial industry. We’re especially looking for involvement from organisations that have women in leadership positions. Spaces are limited, so make sure you get in early and secure your spot.
Don’t miss out on these special marketing opportunities — contact Anna Muldrock on 0432 544 691 or amuldrock@intermedia.com.au
wwwcivicsurveysolutions.com.au