Author: caulhub

The National Creating Healthy Liveable Cities Report won the ‘Cutting Edge Research and Technology’ category of the Victorian Planning Institute of Australia Awards last Friday.

This report is the first “baseline” measure of liveability in Australia’s state and territory capitals and represents the culmination of 5 years of research. The report will now go through to the National Awards for Planning Excellence ceremony, which acknowledges the best of planning and planners around Australia.

You can read the full report here.

There is growing recognition of the importance of biogenic emissions on atmospheric chemistry and air quality within urban air-sheds (especially in cities surrounded by densely forested regions). A collaborative campaign involving the University of Wollongong and the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (ANSTO) will involve running the Biogenic Ambient Atmospheric Sampling System (BAASS) for state-of-the-science measurements of the chemicals emitted by trees (biogenic volatile organic compounds or VOCs).

The campaign will begin in earnest in the coming weeks and will form the prelude to the larger scale International campaign COALA (Characterising Organics and Aerosol Loading in Australia). Find out more here.

Featured image credit: Josh Withers via Unsplash

Cecily Maller presented a paper at ‘Urban nature: the governance and politics of nature-based solutions in the city, International Workshop’ for the EU Horizon 2020 NATURVATION project at the Parc de Recerca Biomèdica de Barcelona.

Her paper, titled ‘Cities as more-than-human habitat and the politics of who nature-based solutions are for’ discussed how nature-based solutions have the opportunity to transform the governance, planning and design of cities for more than just people – and how more-than-human thinking can help them achieve this.

Cecily also wrote this article for Foreground, on how more-than-human thinking can help resolve many issues with our current thinking about cities and health. And it’s the #1 trending article on Foreground’s website for November!

Featured image credit: Marcus Ward via Foreground

CAUL Hub sponsored and spoke at the STREAMS Connect Summit, hosted by Indigilab in Sydney. This forum and workshop focused on how Indigenous and non-Indigenous scientists, policy makers and educators can work together to address climate change and contribute to Australia’s response to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

During their presentation, Luke Briscoe (CEO of Indigilab and member of CAUL’s Indigenous Advisory Group) and Dr Cathy Oke (CAUL’s Knowledge Broker) identified CAUL’s Indigenous Engagement and Participation framework as a potential cultural framework to align with the SDGs. Indigilab is now in the process of developing a Summit report, which will be publicly available and sent to the government. As a member of the Indigenous Peoples Major Group on SDGs, Indigilab will also be communicating outcomes from the Summit with this group.