Wave dynamics are critical to ocean industries, coastal development and leisure activities, and this project will enhance wave data collections in Australia.
The Australian Research Data Commons (ARDC) has recently announced new investment into the 2020 Australian Data Partnership program, which supports the establishment and development of national level data assets that support leading edge research and drive increased benefits to society.
Sebastien Mancini, the leader of IMOS’ data Facility the Australian Ocean Data Network (AODN), will lead this new project (https://doi.org/10.47486/DP748) to develop national infrastructure for in-situ wave observations.
“This project will bring together a number of organisations across various sectors including IMOS, Commonwealth agencies, state agencies, universities and private industries, to enhance the delivery of freely available in-situ wave observations collaboratively through the IMOS/AODN infrastructure,” says Sebastien Mancini.
A marine Research Data Cloud (RDC) project funded by the ARDC in 2018 enabled the collation, assembly and standardisation of Australia’s surface wave buoy collections for near real-time and legacy data from the early 1970s to present. Real-time and delayed mode data are available on the Integrated Marine Observing System’s AODN Portal and these two collections have been consistently in the top 15 most downloaded datasets since their release.
Building on these popular current surface wave data collections this new project will enhance their use within and beyond Australia. The project will create an expanded, harmonised, standardise and trustworthy collection of wave measurements, collected by a range of platforms, and make it available to researchers and other stakeholders.
The project will also develop best practices and procedures for quality control, metadata and data formats for legacy and emerging wave measurement systems.
“The project will clear the way for future wave data providers by developing and documenting data workflows, quality control procedures, and metadata and data standards allowing them to easily contribute to this critical data collection,” says Sebastien Mancini.