Since the 1960s, Australia's urbanization rate has consistently been above 80 percent, and in 2024 it has reached its highest ever rate at 86.75 percent. Historically, Australia has been one of the most urbanized countries in the world, due to high rates of immigration since the 20th century, which were generally to coastal, urban areas. However, despite its high urbanization rate, Australia is among the largest countries in the world; therefore its population density is among the lowest in the world.

The Temperate Highland Peat Swamps on Sandstone of the Sydney Basin occur in the headwaters of Sydney’s drinking water catchments and are listed as endangered ecosystems, yet they have suffered habitat losses and degradation due to human impacts such as urbanisation. Despite ongoing efforts to restore and better protect upland swamps, they remain poorly understood, potentially hindering the effectiveness of management efforts. Essential to overall ecosystem function and the provision of services for human and environmental benefit are the microbial component of wetland ecosystems. In the case of these swamps, the microbes, have not yet been studied. Here, we investigated differences in the microbial community of upland swamps in urbanised catchments compared to swamps from natural catchments in the Blue Mountains. A total of twelve swamps were sampled, six from within urbanised catchments and six with intact vegetation catchments, to compare sediment conditions and microbial community and genes expression and abundances. Catchment impervious area and number of stormwater drains entering a swamp, indicators for urbanisation, positively correlated with the pH and ammonium concentration of swamp sediment. Community analysis of the 16S rRNA gene (T-RFLP, qPCR) revealed the elevated pH of urbanised swamps coincided with changes to the abundance of bacteria and archaea. Furthermore, RT-qPCR revealed genes involved in carbon cycling (mcrA & pmoA) were more likely to be found in urbanised swamps. Taken together, our results indicate that urbanisation of the Blue Mountains is impacting the environmental services provided by the microbial community of upland swamps in the Sydney Basin.

Australia Internally Displaced Persons: New Displacement Associated with Disasters data was reported at 4,700.000 Case in 2023. This records a decrease from the previous number of 17,000.000 Case for 2022. Australia Internally Displaced Persons: New Displacement Associated with Disasters data is updated yearly, averaging 10,500.000 Case from Dec 2008 (Median) to 2023, with 16 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 51,000.000 Case in 2020 and a record low of 1,000.000 Case in 2010. Australia Internally Displaced Persons: New Displacement Associated with Disasters data remains active status in CEIC and is reported by World Bank. The data is categorized under Global Database’s Australia – Table AU.World Bank.WDI: Population and Urbanization Statistics. Internally displaced persons are defined according to the 1998 Guiding Principles (http://www.internal-displacement.org/publications/1998/ocha-guiding-principles-on-internal-displacement) as people or groups of people who have been forced or obliged to flee or to leave their homes or places of habitual residence, in particular as a result of armed conflict, or to avoid the effects of armed conflict, situations of generalized violence, violations of human rights, or natural or human-made disasters and who have not crossed an international border. 'New Displacement' refers to the number of new cases or incidents of displacement recorded over the specified year, rather than the number of people displaced. This is done because people may have been displaced more than once.;The Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre (http://www.internal-displacement.org/);Sum;

Metadata record for data from ASAC Project 570 See the link below for public details on this project.

From the abstracts of the referenced papers:

The Larsemann Hills, Princess Elizabeth Land, Antarctica, has been the site for large winter bases built by the People's Republic of China and the USSR and a small summer base built by Australia. The three bases are located within 3 km of one another. Station development has occurred since 1986 and consequently environmental changes have been very sudden. Associated with station development has been the establishment of a road network on one peninsula. Visitors to the area have risen in number from 71 in 1987 to a conservative estimate of 445 in 1991. The increased number of human visitors has resulted in rubbish and other evidence of visitation being observed over almost 10 square kilometres. This paper attempts to outline environmental impacts observed by the authors since 1986.

Water quality parameters of the surface water from two permanent sampling sites on the Samford Creek, southeast Queensland, Australia, are determined. The parameters include major cations and anions, plus total inorganic and organic nitrogen and phosphorus. This data is sampled to investigate the effects of land use change, in particular urbanisation, on the aquatic system in a peri-urban environment. Further, the data will be used to validate a catchment hydrological model of the area using the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT), which will simulate the effects of different land use scenarios on the catchment water balance and nutrient fluxes.

Physico-chemical parameters of the surface water from two permanent sampling sites on the Samford Creek, southeast Queensland, Australia, are determined. The parameters include temperature, pH, turbidity, dissolved oxygen and conductivity. In addition, a velocity Doppler measures flow rate and creek height at these two locations. This data is collected continuously and averaged over 10-minute intervals to investigate the effects of land use change, in particular urbanisation, on the aquatic system in a peri-urban environment. hown here are daily averages of the 10-minute data. Further, the data will be used to validate a catchment hydrological model of the area using the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT), which will simulate the effects of different land use scenarios on the catchment water balance and nutrient fluxes.

Dataset containing the six strategic environmental assessment reports used for the study titled "Biodiversity and ecosystem services in strategic environmental assessment: An evaluation of six Australian cases":

Physico-chemical parameters of the surface water from two permanent sampling sites on the Samford Creek, southeast Queensland, Australia, are determined. The parameters include temperature, pH, turbidity, dissolved oxygen and conductivity. In addition, a velocity Doppler measures flow rate and creek height at these two locations. This data is collected continuously and averaged over 10-minute intervals to investigate the effects of land use change, in particular urbanisation, on the aquatic system in a peri-urban environment. hown here are daily averages of the 10-minute data. Further, the data will be used to validate a catchment hydrological model of the area using the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT), which will simulate the effects of different land use scenarios on the catchment water balance and nutrient fluxes.