2021-08-28
An Overview of the book Eyes in the Sky: Surveillance for Survival – The history and future possibilities for satellite remote sensing in the Western Australian Government. pp. 296.
By the authors, Richard Smith, PhD and Henry Houghton, BAppSc
Ninety two percent of the State of WA is Crown Land, held in trust by government for present and future generations.[i]This area along with the 7% in agriculture represents a massive potential photosynthetic sink for CO2 to counter global warming from rising greenhouse gas emissions. To help realise this benefit the authors conclude their book by recommending adoption of NASA’s example of an Earth Observatory to … share with the public the images, stories, and discoveries about the environment, Earth systems, and 
climate that emerge from ... research, including ... satellite missions, in-the-field research, and models.[ii] Such sharing of information about WA’s renewable (environmental) resources would improve transparency of government, and help reverse the decline in public respect for democracy.[iii]
The authors reveal that from only two Earth Observing satellites 40 years ago, the WA Government is now using over sixteen, to reveal the human impacts on renewable resources from over-clearing, overgrazing, uncontrolled wildfires, salinisation and soils being washed out to sea by water and wind erosion. Also, the devastation to coastlines and coastal ecosystems from rising ocean temperatures, sea-levels and toxic algal blooms. 
It is not surprising government lets the public see little of what these satellites are revealing. The nightly weather forecast on TV is as close the public gets to see the outcome of Earth Observations from satellite – a fraction of the true story.
To gather the full story of the birth of satellite remote sensing in WA, the authors (in retirement) met monthly for 10 years in the purpose-built Leeuwin Centre for Earth Sensing Technologies in Floreat WA. Then in 2016, just 23 years after its foundation, without any announcement, the Centre was abandoned by Landgate – not the building, but the staff, the public gallery of satellite imagery, earth system models and world class information products. Where the hardcopies of all the years of satellite imagery went, nobody knows but some was salvaged and displayed at the launch of this book in July 2021. Some of the people skills developed within the Leeuwin Centre were moved to Landgate’s head office in Midland and placed behind closed doors away from public access while others moved to jobs in other key government agencies. Some of the world class products moved east. CSIRO in the Leeuwin Centre moved across town to their mineral’s laboratory in South Perth.
The authors who unravelled this story were two public servants who had over 30 years introduced the technology into the WA Government. Henry Houghton a surveyor in the Department of Lands and Survey began the task in 1976. For WA’s renewable resources to be managed sustainably, he recognised the importance of collaboration, sharing of knowledge and recruiting a range of scientific skills, which included his co-author CSIRO Earth Systems Scientist, Richard Smith, who continued the task from 1991 to 2010. Henry persuaded the WA Labour Government in 1991 to invest some $5 million in the purpose-built Leeuwin Centre for Earth Sensing Technologies, to co-locate remote sensing groups from CSIRO, WA Government, Curtin University, TAFE and Industry.
He also negotiated the formation of WASTAC (WA Satellite Technology and Application Consortium) of BoM, CSIRO, WA Government, Curtin and Murdoch Universities, for the real-time reception of data being broadcast free to ground from polar orbiting environmental satellites. This enabled WASTAC to complement the expensive higher resolution satellite data being collected by the Commonwealth at the Alice Springs receiving station at the behest of the mineral’s industry. With the Leeuwin Centre and WASTAC, WA by the beginning of the 21st Century had developed the most advanced remote sensing capability within Australia with many ground breaking achievements for the management of renewable resources.[iv] Why then was it abandoned?
The official reason given was that the core business of WA Dept Land Information (Landgate) was to protect private property covering barely 1% of the State. The true reason was the massive productivity benefits flowing from the digitization of WA’s paper-based Land Title Registry were to be sold to a Canadian superannuation fund and the software for running a digital registry was to be commercialised.[v]
This experience, revealed the dangers of a fundamental conflict between two alternative ways of understanding our home, derived from the Greek word “Oikos”: Economy, a human fantasy that creates its own science and laws and Ecology, the Laws of Nature that shows no mercy for the fantasies of Economy. In orthodox economics the environment is an externality.
For the future, it is fortunate other nations are continuing to develop and deploy more advanced Earth Observing sensors, to both measure and manage the sources of rising Greenhouse Gas emissions. Also, sensors to help counter unavoidable emissions, by managing the massive photosynthetic sinks for CO2 from plant and algal life on land and in oceans.
Australia’s photosynthetic carbon sinks are massive, estimated by CSIRO to be over 700M tonnes of CO2-e worth over $100 billion to landholders as Australian Carbon Credit Units.[vi] The market in these ACCU’s were described in the press as the Government’s ‘dirty little secret’ – a carbon price none the less.[vii] WA’s ACCU potential is vast, particularly where 99% the land remains Crown Land and agriculture. As a result for the South West the Department of Primary Industry and Regional Development has just announced a $15 million Western Australian Carbon Farming and Land Restoration Program, to sequester carbon in the landscape, contributing to the growth of the Western Australian carbon farming market.[viii] To help access these massive returns, satellite data and products are freely available, but government investment in the science, education and implementation will be vital – similar to managing the COVID-19 pandemic.[ix]
The environmental movement was greatly enhanced 53 years ago when the earth was first seen from space as the one living planet in the vastness of the Universe. Earth Observing Satellites – Eyes in the Sky – soon followed surveying the world day and night, revealing the undeniable truths about human impacts. Such measurements are vital for managing the future. The authors trust their book will stimulate the government and the public to better use these Eyes in the Sky, for the results of their Surveillance becomes, week by week more essential for our Survival. A revolution, recognised 42 years ago by the UWA Professor of Geography, Joseph Gentilli, as ‘the most powerful and effective technique of regional analyses’ available.[x]
[i] Crown Land Administration in Western Australia, September 1994. Department of Land Administration
[ii] https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/ (Accessed 29 July 2021)
[iii] G Stoker, M Evans and M Halupka, 2018, Trust and Democracy in Australia: Democratic decline and renewal. Report 1. University of Canberra.
[iv] Ron Hutchinson, 2016, Managing a Million Square Miles: A History of Western Australia’s Department of Lands and Surveys. Hesperian Press. page 301.
[v] Nick Evans, 2018, Swiss giant Adecco could be the big winner out of the State Government’s Landgate sale. The West Australian 29th June 2018.
[vi] Ross Garnaut, 2019, SUPER POWER: Australia’s Low Carbon Opportunity. Kindle Loc. 1932
[vii] A. Macdonald-Smith and J. Greber, 2021, Money Grows on Trees in Australia’s secret Carbon Market. AFR – 26-27 July 2021 page 1.
[viii] https://www.agric.wa.gov.au/carbon-farming/western-australian-carbon-farming-and-land-restoration-program (Accessed 27 July 2021).
[ix] Mariana Mazzucato, 2018, The Entrepreneurial State; Debunking Public vs Private Sector Myths. Penguin. p.213
[x] J. Gentilli, 1979, Regions and Landscapes: nature and size, function and change’, p.29 in Gentilli, J. (ed.) Western Landscapes. Crawley: The University of Western Australia Press
[Opinions expressed are those of the author and not official policy of Greens WA]