A virtual national data grid for Australia ? current situation and vision for the future

Abstract

Seamless access and efficient management of vast quantities of resource data is a significant and increasing challenge for both government and industry. CSIRO and Schlumberger embarked on a joint a study of geoscience data exchange between industry and government, based on their complementary domain of expertise and networks of national agencies and industry. It is clear that rapidly increasing volumes of data; the need for faster, more-efficient business practices; lowprice data storage and higher Internet bandwidth will change the way that companies and governments do business. To explore current perceptions and future directions for geoscience data management and data exchange, interviews were conducted with 19 petroleum companies, 9 minerals companies, 11 government groups, 4 software providers and 2 CRCs. Perceptions in data exchange vary widely between industry and government. However, some common themes emerge: few groups have the resources to properly manage, curate and add-value to data. Much time is spent (and wasted) in moving data around. Companies generally ?minimally comply? with regulations for data submission as they see little advantage in putting any more time into data submission than is required by legislation. Finally, data management is usually seen as a financial and administrative burden rather than an enabler to add value. The vision promoted by most people visited can be summarised as the immediate need for a ?Single interface that delivers all validated spatial geoscientific data independent of database structure and location?. The need for a multi-agency collaborative virtual databases is clear, and the way forward is as much controlled by policy issues as with technological enablers.