New research has been approved for further development, with five new research concepts approved by Natural Hazards Research Australia’s (the Centre) Board in May.
The concepts were submitted by the Centre’s network of Participants in March 2024 and will ensure that the research funded strengthens natural hazard resilience and disaster risk reduction across Australia, based directly on Participant organisational needs.
The approved project concepts are:
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Priming next generation capabilities in multi-hazard public information and warnings addresses the knowledge and capability gaps in the optimal design of multi-hazard public information and warning system interfaces. The research will focus on usability, comprehension and accessibility for all communities – including those from all generations, culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds, people with disability and those from Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities.
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Extending the range of core forest fire spread to ensure their effectiveness in supporting decision-making for incident management across all conditions will improve the ability of fire spread models’ to accurately predict fire behaviour and spread under milder, low wind conditions. The research will observe forest fire behaviour to quantify the relationships: between air temperature; relative humidity; average 10m wind speed; wind direction and relevant fuel parameters to support decision-making around the appropriateness of suppression tactics.
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Understanding earthquake risk in Australia: locating unreinforced masonry buildings aims to reduce the risk posed by unreinforced masonry building to people during an earthquake. The research will develop a national database of unreinforced masonry building through new technology and techniques to better understand and mitigate earthquake risk.
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The value and benefit of emergency services: how do we measure success? aims to identify performance measures to support emergency response agencies to optimise policy and regulatory framework and streamline governance, plans and efforts, with a focus on fire and rescue services. The project will determine relevant, measurable meaningful measures that effectively demonstrates the value of the services delivered to the community.
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Assisted relocations post flood: lessons and learnings will build disaster management capability by identifying lessons learnt from existing large-scale assisted relocation programs and how they can be applied in the delivery of the Resilient Homes Fund and the Recovery and Resilience Package and similar programs. The project will provide a regional picture of the potential scale of climate migration and allow for a better understanding of how natural hazard and risk, climate change impacts, population dynamics and development settings shape mobility trends – highlighting the farsighted planning needed to meet slow-onset climate challenges and ensure positive and sustainable development outcomes.
Additional information about these projects will be available soon.
The Centre continues to streamline and target the project concept submission process for 2024 and beyond. Learn more here.
Explore more of our research projects here.