As the climate warms, making accurate predictions of how the weather and other earth systems are changing is essential for humanity to prepare and adapt for the future.
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The Australian National University has been awarded $7.6 million in federal government funding to develop software for the climate research community to make better predictions.
Professor Andy Hogg has been appointed the inaugural director of the Australian Community Climate System Simulator National Research Infrastructure, known as ACCESS-NRI.
He said the investment in climate modelling would allow researchers around the country to better track and predict changes in the earth's oceans, sea-ice, carbon cycles and land surfaces.
"There's some things about climate that are inherently hard to predict, but the more we know about the system and the better we can model it, the more chance we have of knowing what's coming and preparing for it in advance," Professor Hogg said.
"Our job is to develop the tools that will enable that prediction to happen."
The modelling is made possible by the Gadi supercomputer on the ANU campus, which is the largest supercomputer in the Southern Hemisphere.
Professor Hogg came on board as director in March and is now recruiting a team of software engineers.
The computer simulations and modelling will be used by researchers from other universities, the Bureau of Meteorology and CSIRO, as well as overseas researchers.
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The software will be open-source, meaning the development will be available for anyone to use and therefore multiplying the benefits.
"We made the case that ... caring after long-term software development is just as important as caring for physical infrastructure and that's what our community uses to do their research," Professor Hogg said.
The project will be funded for three years, with the hope of ongoing funding if it is successful.
Professor Hogg said over the next five to 10 years the modelling would be able to simulate processes down to finer scale and make better projections of regional climate and weather.
"Without climate models we wouldn't have known that climate change was coming. And it was predicted a long time ago by climate models and those predictions have turned out to be very good. So we want to keep doing a better job," he said.
Having worked at the ANU for 15 years in oceanography at the research school of earth sciences, Professor Hogg said he was excited for a new challenge.
"It's daunting. It's a big job, but it's different and I think it's a chance to have a big impact on the field and on society.
"So I'm optimistic."
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