all right and good morning, everyone and my name
is Alex Cook. And on behalf of the C.S.I.R.O,
I'd like to welcome you to this morning's Webcast to
discuss the National Science Foundation's Global Centres program. Um
so this webcast aims to be a high level discussion
on this new programme and an overview of the opportunity
for Australia based researchers to take part in global centers
in partnership with the US, UK and Canada.
So, as I said, my name is Alex
Cook. I'm the general manager of the Missions Program
Office in C.S.I.R.O and I'll introduce the rest of our
speakers very shortly. But first I want to begin
by acknowledging the traditional owners of the many lands that
were meeting on today and pay my respects to elders
past and present. I'm in Canberra and so I'd
like to acknowledge that none of all people and it
seems only fitting that we also acknowledge the extraordinary contribution
the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people have made to
scientific knowledge and methods which have been transmitted from one
generation to the next and which are informing solutions for
a more sustainable future. We need to recognise respect
and value indigenous knowledge systems. We're developing our shared
vision for solving our nation's greatest challenges. And so
I might ask our organiser to slip to the next
slide, if that's possible. Excellent and and to
the next one. So today is meant to be
a two way exercise with an opportunity for you to
ask questions. And now there are two ways to
interact. Please use the chat function that's marked by
a speech bubble on the right side of the screen
for informal conversation and to report any technical issues.
And please use the Q and A feature marked by
a question mark on the right side of the screen
to submit questions for the presenters. You may do
this at any time of the presentations, and we'll
coordinate and bring together some of the questions for the
Q and A at the end. Please bare in
mind that although we'll endeavour to answer your questions during
today's webinar, time is limited. We have only
an hour, and we may not get to them
all. If you ask a question and we don't
have time to answer it, please visit our website.
Check the FAQs or email us at global
applications at C.S.I.R.O dot au and we'll place the link
to that email address in the chat. So I
wanted to specifically welcome to colleagues that we have joining
us from the National Science Foundation and so that's Paul
Raterron and Karen Lips. Now Paul and Karen have
been instrumental in establishing the Global Centres Program and working
within the NSF and across the participating countries to establishing
this new program. And speaking with me today,
we have Ruth Pring strategy manager for the C.S.I.R.O missions
program and joining us for the Q and A.
We also have representatives from a number of the missions
within Siro who are here to answer any questions relating
to the mission topics and after the presentations will open
the Webcast to you for questions. But first I
just want to briefly hand over to Paul to introduce
himself and Karen have it to you pull from relax.
My name is Paul Raterron and Alex said I'm one
of the program officer managing the Global Centers program at
the National Science Foundation at the NSF, and I'm
very happy to be here. Thank you for the
invitation and I'm happy to help answering some of the
question about the NSF and the global centre program during
the Q and A and I'm here with Karen lips.
My colleagues was going to introduce yourself now. Thank
you. It's great to be here. We're very
excited to be partnering with C.S.I.R.O and we look forward
to hearing more from the presentation. Thank you,
Paul. And thank you, Karen. Um so
over the next few minutes, I'd like to provide
an overview of the NSF, the Global Centres program.
An outline of why CSIRO has joined this initiative,
what we're hoping to achieve through our missions programme and
why we're looking for partnerships across Australia's innovation system to
help us respond to national and indeed international challenges.
And then I'll have to Ruth to go through some
of the details of the actual programme called before going
to Q and A. Now the National Science Foundation
is an independent science agency, an independent federal agency
that supports science and engineering in the US The NSF
fulfils its goals chiefly by making grants in an NSF
investments account for about 25% of federal support to America's
colleges and universities for basic research research driven by curiosity
and discovery. NSF also supports solutions oriented research with
the potential to produce advancements for the American people.
NSF's international partnerships support collaboration and complementary priorities between research
communities in the US and other countries. Now the
NSF Global Centers Program is an ambitious new initiative which
is intended to fund international interdisciplinary collaborative research centres that
will apply best practises of broadening participation and community engagement
to develop use, inspired or applied research on climate
change and clean energy, leading to foreseeable benefits to society.
The global Center's programme is an NSF led effort implemented
in partnership with like minded international funders to encourage and
support large scale collaborative research on these use-inspired themes
and the NSF partner countries in this inaugural Global Centers
competition are Australia, Canada and the UK, Um and
we're partnering through a number of the funding institutions within
those jurisdictions. So in the UK, it's UK
RI um in Canada. It's two of the funding
agencies that are partnering from that jurisdiction. Now,
the total value of the Global Centres programme is 70
million US with up to Australian dollars $7 million available
to Australian researcher institutions. The programme aims to prioritise
research collaborations that foster team science uh, community engaged
research and use knowledge to action frameworks. The proposed
research work should maximise the benefits of international interdisciplinary collaborations
and project outcomes should help the assessment and/or the
mitigation of climate change, impacts on society, people
and communities, and all the development of clean energy
solutions and through the NSF global centres. Australian researchers
will be able to join with partners in the US.
and other countries to mitigate climate change impacts and
develop clean energy solutions. Now there are two tracks
to the call. The first track, called Global
Centre Implementation is around. Proposals to advance use inspired
research in climate change and our clean energy involving U.
S. Team supported by the NSF working in collaboration
with the foreign teams from Australia, Canada and the
UK there is a second track called Community Driven Global
Centre Design, but just to be clear, this
is not funded by CSIRO um. It is intended
to provide seed funding for US based researchers who are
wishing to coordinate efforts to design a global centre for
the next NSF global centres competition. Australian based researchers
can be involved in that track, but there's no
direct funding opportunity from the Australian side. So I
wanted to start by stepping back to what the role
of CSIRO is in this whole process and why were
involved in the NSF call now as the science,
a national science agency, C.S.I.R.O has an important role
to play in connecting and strengthening the Australian innovation system,
ensuring that we are equipped to meet our biggest challenges
for the future. This means harnessing global networks and
facilitating opportunities for collaborative research across industry, government and
science organisations. CSIRO has a mandate to deliver benefit
to Australian industry and society by tackling the scientific and
technological challenges facing Australia. Many of these challenges that
are facing Australia are also being seen on a global
scale. Now global collaboration is critical in addressing the
most pressing challenges that the world faces today. We're
partnering with the NSF creates opportunities for collaboration and opportunity
and innovation around these. As Australia's National Science Agency,
CSIRO has a unique leadership role to address societal challenges
on behalf of and working with the broader science,
technology and innovation system. Our founding legislation outlines our
responsibility for conducting scientific research for the benefit of the
Australian community and to further national priorities. It also
highlights our role as a means of liaison between Australia
and other countries in matters connected with scientific research.
And so in 2022 Sorrow and the US NSF signed
a memorandum of understanding to establish multiple pathways for expanding
and deepening research collaborations between the US and Australia.
C.S.I.R.O has already supported activities across the Australian Innovation System
by funding the Convergence Accelerator Initiative, which is focused
around collaborations on sustainable materials as well as funding to
support collaborations that have the potential to deliver transformative findings
in the areas of responsible and equitable AI and we're
now progressing collaborations between sorrow and the NSF to work
on these global centres which we're here to talk about
now. Now CSIRO is proud to be partnering with the
NSF and research and innovation agencies in Canada and the
UK to launch this programme, and we're one of
the international co sponsors in the with with our partner
countries. The programme demonstrates CSIRO's commitment to developing use,
inspired research on climate change and energy, establishing research
collaborations and partnerships across the national and global innovation ecosystem
that support areas of national interests and priorities and national
challenges, and aims to support projects that deliver on
the objectives of missions in CSIRO's Missions programme. And
so I wanted to go into what the CSIRO's missions
programme is. It's intense and how it's relevant.
So now the nature of the challenges that we face
today can't be treated with single interventions and single science
projects. So we're increasingly called on to develop solutions
to challenges that are systemic, complex and urgent.
Several years ago, CSIRO identified six challenges at the
air as the areas of greatest importance to Australians,
and we seek to solve these challenges through our portfolio
of missions. Together, The challenges and missions are
intended to support Australia's recovery and resilience and respond to
the most pressing challenges that we face nationally and internationally.
And we define a mission as a portfolio of coordinated
and integrated approaches, but tailored specifically to mobilise science,
technology and innovation in order to address well defined to
address well defined objectives related to a societal challenge in
a defined time frame, each of our emissions have
objectives that are ambitious but realistic and have broad societal
relevance, and you'll hear a bit about a few
of them shortly, Mission activity encourages collaboration across multiple
scientific disciplines, including the social sciences as well as
industrial sectors and engagement with multiple actors, including the
public, private and civil society organisations. The slide
you can see shows the missions that are currently in
CSIRO's portfolio, and this includes those that have been
launched and also those which are under scoping phase and
under development for the global centres. Call. Four
of our missions have identified thematic areas that will support
the achievement of their ambitions. These are the ones
highlighted in red on this slide, namely hydrogen industry
Towards Net zero, Smart Energy and Renewable Energy Powerhouse.
Now the solicitation document that's been released as part of
the Global Centres Call includes details on each of these
themes that have been identified by the missions. Broadly,
they relate to six potential areas, so that's pathways
To Net Zero net zero regional transitions, reducing methane
emissions, integrated energy systems, intelligence, critical energy,
minerals and energy storage and scaling clean hydrogen markets and
applications that are involved involved in Australian Participant will need
to align with one of the listed mission related themes
and so what I want to do now is go
through each of the missions, those four missions that
I've mentioned and the themes that have been identified to
give you a bit of a sense of what the
areas of interest for those missions look like. And,
as I mentioned, we've got the mission leads on
the call here who will be able to answer questions
during the Q and A session now The towards Net
zero mission aims to partner with both regions and industries
for a low emissions future by bringing together research,
industry, government and communities. That aims to help
Australia's hardest to abate sectors, which includes steel,
aviation and agriculture. To have their emissions by 2035.
Michael Battaglia is the mission lead for the towards net
zero emission and his online, and we'll be happy
to answer any questions. There are three topics that
are of interest under the mission that are relevant to
the global centres call. The first of these is
the pathways to net zero call, where proposals are
sought to directly address the challenge of lowering carbon emissions
while building regional energy and resources security by directly identifying
decarbonization, or emissions reduction options and pathways, along
with their interaction with land use, economy and socio
economic values. The second of these is Net zero
regional transitions where proposals are sought that can help identify
approaches and frameworks to identify opportunities and vulnerabilities of regions
and precincts in Net zero transition. And finally reducing
methane emissions with proposals being sought to improve accounting and
identify emissions. Baselines that allow industry to experiment with
mitigation strategies. The second of the missions that I
wanted to to call out is the Hydrogen Industry mission,
which has the ambition of supporting global decarbonization through supporting
the establishment of a commercially viable Australian hydrogen industry comprising
both domestic and export value chains. By 2030.
Vicki Au is the deputy mission lead and Vicki's on
the call here, and we'll be happy to answer
any questions. Um, the mission has identified one
topic area as part of its Global Centers call,
and that relates to scaling green hydrogen markets, and
proposals are sought that support the development and uptake of
hydrogen technologies in the following key areas. Mobility is
an early target market for hydrogen industry development. Hydrogen
utilisation in heavy industry as a longer term demand driver
and hydrogen energy systems integration. The third mission is
the renewable energy powerhouse Mission. Now this mission is
seeking to bring together some of the work within CSIRO
and other partners across the Australian system relating to critical
energy, metals and energy storage. To deliver sovereign
solutions decarbonise is our energy systems. This
mission is in scoping phase. UH, that has
the aim to unlock the full economic potential of our
energy metals by creating and demonstrating breakthrough technologies. Now
there's one topic under this mission which is being called
out as part of the Global Centres Call and that
relates to critical energy, metals and energy storage with
proposals to address any of the following areas supply demand,
economic resource and criticality assessment tools, critical minerals for
renewable energy, secondary sources around the assessment of mine
waste streams, tailings and landfill to determine the richest
secondary sources of critical minerals as well as systems and
integration, where the challenges for Australia to look at
moving towards a decarbonised energy sector. Chris Vernon is
the mission lead for that particular mission and his online
and happy to answer any questions and finally smart energy.
Uh, so The smart energy mission aims to enable
reliable, affordable and sustainable and equitable energy for communities
and businesses. It aims to do this by delivering
an integrated framework for energy system evaluations and forecasting by
boosting the digital capability of our energy system operations and
by integrating distributed energy resources, data and services to
benefit all Australians. And there's one topic under the
this particular mission which relates to integrated energy systems intelligence
with proposal sort that draw on the latest advances in
fields such as energy systems and power systems, engineering,
environmental science, social science, complex systems, modelling
digital systems and physics. Informed artificial intelligence to address
one or more of the following areas relating to integrated
multi energy system transformation, including the practical realities
of installed assets and carbon water and land use constraints,
integration and optimisation of distributed energy resources with specific focus
on system performance, social acceptance and energy equity and
then multi energy system digitalisation and Stephen Craig is on
the call and he's the lead for this particular mission.
So I've given you an overview of the Missions programme
and the Global centres at its broadest level. What
I want to do now is hand over to Ruth
Pring, who will provide you with some details around
the specifics of the global centres call itself and what
we're expecting from Australian applicants. So over to you,
Ruth, Thank you so much, Alex. Hi,
everyone. I'm Ruth Pring. I'm a strategy manager
from the C.S.I.R.O Missions Office and I'm going to share
with you some details about the solicitation process for the
global Centres programme. In terms of the funding opportunity,
NSF anticipates making awards of up to $5 million US Dollars to
each centre, with international funding agencies expected to support
roughly comparable effort by their own researchers. For Australia
based applicants, there's a total of $7 million Australian dollars available
over five financial years from FY 24 through to FY
28. There is no minimum or maximum grant amount
within that bracket, but we expect proposals to be
in the vicinity of 3 to 5 million.
To be eligible for this funding, you must be
an Australia based participant for a global centre proposal and
you must be based in a university identified as a
table A or table B provider under the Higher Education
Support Act or a corporate commonwealth entity or publicly funded
research agency or a cooperative research centre, and you
must comply with the Australian Code for the responsible conduct
of research. Your global centre partnership must involve the
US and Australia, and collaboration with one or more
other countries and multiple partners or constituencies is encouraged.
For Australia based applicants, funding will only be available
for activities that fall under the definition of research covering
basic research. Applied research and experimental development proposals will
be particularly welcome from Australian based applicants who seek to
work with indigenous communities and organisations to create indigenous driven
science solutions. To help you navigate the solicitation process.
I want to clarify the roles of C.S.I.R.O and NSF.
The Global Centres programme is led by NSF. CSIRO
is a funding partner agency. As such, NSF
should be your main source of information about the programme
and the proposal process. Your proposal must be submitted
directly to NSF by your lead US partner CSIRO as
Funding Partner Agency is here to advise Australia based applicants
on their eligibility and Australia specific criteria and requirements in
terms of dates. The NSF solicitation document sets out
the application process in detail, but Here's a timeline
of the key dates. Your application must be submitted
to the NSF by the eligible US based Collaborating applicant
by the 10th of May 2023 after applications are submitted.
Bare in mind that CSIRO make contact Australian applicants to
request information and application details for the purposes of eligibility
and compliance checking and for preparing for grant agreement negotiations.
It's expected that grants will be awarded in September.
The review Merit assessment and decisions about awards will be
made between May to September and NSF is responsible for
the merit review of proposals. The NSF Merit review
process will include an assessment of whether the requirements and
criteria for Australian applicants have been met. NSF will
make best efforts to include reviewers on their assessment panel
who are knowledgeable about the science landscape in Australia.
CSIRO are post panel collaborators being involved Once NSF have
completed the Merit Review post-award, the CSIRO Missions
Programme Office will act as grant manager, coordinating grant
agreements and reporting for Australia based grantees. I hope
that's provided you with a helpful overview of the process
and I'm going to hand back to Alex now out
on the floor for questions. Okay. Thank you
very much, Ruth, for that overview. And
so, as Ruth mentioned, we're now going to
take the opportunity to do some Q and A with
a number of the members of the people on the
call at the moment. So just to reiterate who
we have So we have Paul Ratteron the
programme Director from the National Science Foundation, Karen Lips,
uh, programme director from the National Science Foundation,
Ruth Pring, who you've just heard from, uh,
Stephen Craig. The mission lead for the smart energy
mission. Chris Vernon. The mission lead for the
renewable energy powerhouse Mission Vicky AU the Deputy mission lead
for hydrogen industry mission and Michael Battaglia, the lead
for the towards net zero emission. So I'm hoping
collectively we will be able to answer all of the
questions that you've You've got to ask for us.
Um, as mentioned there are, I think,
multiple ways to provide your questions into the chat and
they are being moderated and passed to me. Um,
so I'm going to to pass across firstly to Vicky
Au with one of the questions that has come through,
which relates to the scaling green hydrogen bid. Um,
and and one of the questions has asked, but
it seems to be alignment with the scaling green hydrogen
CRC bid. Does this present an opportunity for the
National Science Foundation and for this particular call? So,
Vicky, I'll leave that one to you to answer.
Thanks. And thanks for the question. So the
scaling hydrogen seen green hydrogen CRC, um, that
is going through the Australian process with the normal kind
of CRC. Um, bidding guidelines. The timeline
is a little bit different. Um, that is
going through its first stage now with bringing together partners
from industry and research, and you will be able
to see the programme areas, research programme, areas
that are outlined there. Um, I'll be able
to find it in the background and, um what,
you know what they are. But they do cover
things like, um, land and water production storage.
Um, and I believe there's like, a social
community engagement one as well. There's five research programmes
there. Um, this here is specifically around international
collaboration. Um, so, yes, the themes
are similar, but it's a different process. And,
um, it is a different kind of timeline for
for bidding as well. You may also be familiar that,
um, involvement of international partners in Australian CRC bids.
Um, there's kind of, like, a different
process. And sometimes, um, it's not as
straightforward in that way for taking advantage of that,
Um, but yes, recognise that the theme is
similar. And that's because there is a common problem
that we are trying to address here. That common
challenge of trying to scale up the hydrogen industry.
I hope that has helped with the question, um,
otherwise, please feel free to put in a follow
up one. Excellent. Thanks, Vicky. Um,
now, I might leave this particular next question for
consideration of whether Paul, Karen or Ruth would like
to answer. And this relates to the assessment process.
Um, and, uh, particularly the question around
whether the assessment is undertaken by the National Science Foundation
by itself or National Science Foundation in partnership with C.S.I.R.O.
Um, I'll leave it to your decisions as to
who wants to jump in and answer that one?
Uh, I'll be happy to to answer that.
So the NSF has a very transparent and very critical
process. Uh, so if you log onto the
NSF website, you'll be able to find all kind
of information about how we evaluate and assess, uh,
the quality of the value of the merit of any
proposal which is sent to an NSF and itself will
receive the proposal from, uh, from or the
P I, which are us based with some information,
of course, of the team in Australia in particular
for for this Australia C.S.I.R.O collaboration, I mean in
NSF cycles collaboration and and then we also apply or
a very tricky process. So it goes through external
reviewers panellists and as the others were saying before,
the merit review process will be carried out only by
NSF. Uh, but taking into account, of
course, the mission that C.S.I.R.O just explain, uh,
in the produce recommendation and taking into account all the
priority theme and including of most people, reviewers or
panellists that knows about the landscape of science in Australia.
But the merits review process will be definitely carried out
NSF, and we'll get the final ranking, of
course, For for the final awarding, C.S.I.R.O will
will be discussing with NSF to bring the best
portfolio, uh, for the final decision. Karen,
would you like to add something to that I hope
to resolve. So please ask another question if it's
not excellent. Thank you, Paul, Ruth. I'm
just checking. If you wanted to add anything,
otherwise we might go to the next question. No,
I think that's really clear. But just to reiterate,
CSIRO is not involved with the Merit Review assessment process.
Thanks. Very thanks, Paul. Um so the
other question that I've received is is the $7 million
funding from the Australian side relating to $7 million for
each proposal? Or is there only $7 million in
in total available? I can answer that one,
Alex. So it's $7 million in total available for
potentially multiple centres, depending on the amounts that are
in the proposals and a number of these questions.
I think you'll find the details in the solicitation text
and in some of the guidance material that gets published
on the website. But one thing Ruth you may
want to talk about is the estimated sizes of the
applications from the Australian side that we anticipate in the
way we've stipulated that in the guidelines. Yeah,
absolutely, Alex. So the expectation is that proposals
will be in the vicinity of 3 to $5 million
but there is no maximum or minimum amount as long
as it's within the $7 million bracket. That's correct.
So, yeah, we're looking for Yeah, your
imagination and creativity within that funding envelope. Uh,
the next question also relates to I think, material
that will be made available in the solicitation and again
encourage you to have a look at the website around
the list of the topics under each of the missions.
Um, that will be eligible for consideration. Um,
And so, Ruth, correct me if I'm wrong,
that's in the solicitation documentation. Yeah. The easiest
place to access that information is on the CSIRO dedicated
website for the Global Centres programme. So recommend starting
there, um and there's a reasonable amount of detail
there about the topic areas and also links to the
to further information about their relevant missions. And one
thing I would add is the mission leads who are
on the call here will be very happy to answer
any questions that you might have to understand what their
intent is behind some of the language that's included in
that call, Um, and to ensure that we
come up with robust proposals for consideration through the peer
review process. Um so as we have them on
the call, there's an opportunity for you to ask
any questions of substance relating to the mission topics and
themes being explored. But yeah, it's definitely worth
reaching out to them and having those conversations in the
lead up to the application process. I'm going to,
uh, throw to another question out, and I'm
not sure who is best to answer this one.
Which relates to where does offshore wind energy fit into
the CSIRO priorities? Um, it doesn't seem to
have a home in the categories just explained as opposed
to hydrogen. Um, I'm not sure whether this
may be slightly outside the scope of the NSF Global
Centres call, but I'm going to leave it to
one of the mission leads to jump in and talk
about the extent to which they are thinking about offshore
wind as part of the energy system. Alex,
I can comment on that one. Steve Craig Smart
energy. So one of our focus areas is called
integrated transformation, and that is about all the different
technologies in a broader system context. That could come
into play as we transform the energy system. And
offshore wind could absolutely be one of those. Excellent.
Thanks, Steve. Another question relating to methane emissions,
which I might throw to to Michael, which is
a clear obstacle to reducing methane emissions, is our
current lack of understanding of current emissions. Would research
and improving this understanding fall within the area of science
that's likely to be funded? Absolutely. It would,
um, both need to understand, uh, sources
and attributions of methane emissions from multiple sectors as well
as, uh, technologies to reduce those emissions would
be in scope. Excellent. Um, now does
the towards I'm gonna do a follow up for you,
Michael, based on some of the questions that I'm
getting, But does the towards net zero mission consider
just transition strategies? I'm not sure. The towards
Net zero mission is both about how how do we
support and accelerate transitions? But also, how do
we create the technology pathways to allow that as well
as, um, some of the exante assessment
and prioritisation areas? If you're thinking of the pathways
options. So how do we embed technology into systems
have used to accelerate transitions How do we support transitions
through things like governance and collaborative learning? And then
also, how do we build the four? Citing
and anticipatory systems that allow us to direct action would
all come under that pathways activity. Okay. Thanks,
Michael. Um, a question again for for Ruth,
I think. Which is? So does the Australian
applicants submit the application, or does it go through
a US partner doing the lead? What does that
process look like? And Paul and Karen may want
to answer from a the process of the administration.
How does that look when you're an Australian participant in
a US led call? So to answer the first
part of the question, the application needs to be
submitted by the lead us proponent to directly to NSF
and not to CSIRO now Ill hand to Paul and Karen.
And you want to take this one? Sure.
The US applicant will submit the full proposal through our
online portal. Um, and I believe that the
Australian side also has to submit to the Australian side,
um, their their portion of it. And so
there's a particular requirements in the US side to describe
the partnership with the Australian side of the team including,
for example, the description of the budget that will
be associated with the Australian team separate from the full
budget for the full centre. Yeah, and I'll
have that in, uh, the NSF solicitation.
Uh, you have a specific section which is dedicated
to partnership with Australia, where you will find all
the information that, uh, CSIRO may request,
uh, in the framework of the application for global
Centre. So a good starting point would be,
as before, to go to the CSIRO site,
of course, but also to go to the global
centres Uh, NSF site. And then you can
find the solicitation. And in the solicitation, uh,
one of the specific section you have partnership with Australia
and here you'll find all the neccessary information
you need to know. Thanks, Paul. And
yes, I think just to to reiterate, please
take the time to look through the documentation and also
to have a look at the process of submitting your
component of the information into the NSF. And don't
leave that to the last minute. I understand that
that's not a quick process, so just make sure
that you're prepared early and have already considered some of
the material. A question about eligibility that we've received
is is their opportunities for other publicly funded research organisations
to engage alongside CSIRO in this call, I'll give
that one to Ruth. Yeah, absolutely. Um
So just to reiterate the eligibility requirements, this is
most certainly open to other research organisations outside of CSIRO.
Um, to be eligible, you need to be
from an Australian based, um uh, university,
as identified in table A or table B under the
Higher Education Support Act. Or you can be from
a corporate commonwealth entity or publicly funded research agency or
a C R C. Um, those are the
organisation types from which we'll accept applications. Okay.
Thanks, Ruth. Um, a question about and
I'm not sure whether this could be answered by the
NSF for by the mission leads individually Which is,
will there be a service to connect us leads to
Australian research organisations? So what is that? That
process for building the early stage connections and partnerships uh,
from the NSF side is basic. Uh, let's
so essentially the P I will be in charge of
building the global centres. I mean, essentially to
contact his collaborators partners in, uh, in different
countries including, of course, Australia, which is
for track one very important partner. And, uh,
and they will have to explain how the partnership will
work in the proposal. So and we really expect
very well integrated partnership not parralels toward the same goal
that really, uh, that basically,
the the whole will be bigger than the sum of
the parts. Excellent. Thank you, Paul.
And I might just ask a follow up question,
I think which is relating to the partnerships with the
U. K. And Canadian partners and what that
looks like in terms of building these multinational partnerships.
What do you envisage in terms of the levels of
integration? I'll take this. I think for all
these, they have to be very well integrated.
And so we're hoping to get, um, you
know, trilateral or perhaps four way uh, teams,
including all the different funding agencies in those cases.
Of course, we would expect these these groups of
researchers to have had some prior, um interactions because
that will allow them to really provide a very strong,
cohesive, integrated proposal that will be well, well
received. Excellent. Thanks Karen, Um, So
I'm going to go Another question for Michel, which
again goes back to the methane emissions question is,
will production of fuels such as fuels to mitigate methane
emissions be supported by this programme? Um, we
would definitely be interested in from our missions point of
view, considering sustainable aviation fuels and global opportunities around
around those areas. Um, whilst we don't specifically
focus on a lot of avoided emissions with fuels as
part of integrating that in into broader pathways for economic
transition, you know, and including that into the
integrated assessments would be a clear part of what we'd
be interested in, particularly in that transitions area where
things like, you know, how do these things
get represented into integrated assessment models to build pathways and
allow for the interdependencies in the choices we make would
be a real opportunity. Thanks, Michael. And
one for Vicky, which is, uh, hydrogen
industry programme. Can we target a specific energy producing
technologies such as gas turbines? Um, I believe
so. I think the main thing really is about
those themes of how, um how the proposal,
um, is planning to scale, um, the
hydrogen industry, um, demand utilisation. You'll see
that the, um, three themes that, um,
Alex mentioned earlier about mobility as an early target market
and heavy industry. As you know, a longer
term play. If you can incorporate how gas turbines,
um, come into that, or I think the
last one was about integrated systems. Um, then
certainly you can include that as part of the proposal
bid and, um, the theme of it.
It's really about the application. Thanks, Vicky.
And I think this goes to one of the other
questions that we've received, which is a general one,
which is our The mission leads open discussing open to
discussing specific project ideas directly with Australian chief investigators.
And I think the answer is absolutely yes. Um,
please don't hesitate to contact any of them to have
conversations. I would just encourage you to do it
quickly. Um, given the time period that we've
got for pulling the applications together. And as Karen
and Paul mentioned that level of integration, um,
and and partnership that needs to be in place for
the for the global centres calls. But yeah,
please don't hesitate to reach out to them. Um,
I'm going to go to another question, which is
I'm going to not be able to answer this one,
but just to flag, um, that it's something
that we will need to provide some advice. Or
I suggest that you speak to your research offices about
which is what category of university research funding? Uh,
this would fall under, um and so I don't
have the answer to that one. Um, for
our US colleagues on the call, this is an
idiosyncrasy with the way in which our research block grants
are allocated. Um, and so we will try
and get back to you with an answer on that.
But I suggest that you contact your your individual research
office to come to a view about the best way
of calculating that. Um, another question I've received
is the NSF solicitation stresses fundamental research. But the
messaging from CSIRO sounds more applied. Could anyone comment
on this? So Paul and Karen, I might
get you to comment around kind of where we expect
to see proposals on that TRL scale and that level
of use inspired research that we've been talking about. I can
start and try to do that. So there is
the term used inspired. And, uh, and
we thought a lot about what it means because NSF
is really about the basics research. Uh, so,
uh, what is used inspired basic research and the
way I can we can place it is to say
it's that it has some foreseeable application in in the
future, but foreseeable application. And actually, I'd
like to to insist that we strongly encourage the investigators,
the professors, uh, to to reach out beyond
academia to, uh, the industry non profit and
and all these, uh, collaborators can actually also
contribute to carrying, uh, research out of the
land and into the society and to to find some
associate associated benefits. So I don't know if the
answer is clear. We definitely want basic research.
And yet, uh, with application, foreseeable.
Excellent. Thanks, Paul. That question the answer
to that question is clear to me. Um,
but yeah, please don't hesitate to ask any follow
up questions if you if you have any. Another
question relates to equipment purchases and infrastructure. And is
there a rule about where this should be located?
Uh, in terms of whether it's located within the
U. S. Or one of the partnering institutions
or host countries. Indeed, I would gather that
if the USPI is requesting the
material that NSF funds would go to the U.
USPI and any materials purchased would be
in the, you know, the the lab of
the U. S. Side. And I would
assume the same would apply to request from Australian researchers.
Were CSIRO would be funding that and would remain in
that person's lab. Thanks, Karen. And I
think Ruth, maybe just if you could clarify the
conditions of how the funding could be allocated from the
Australian side so that people understand what the parameters are.
I get you to circle back to me on that
question, Alex, if that's OK, yeah,
no worries. I think the main thing from my
perspective, is it has to meet that definition of
research and funding on capital equipment. We will need
to clarify, particularly around whether there are any restrictions
that we have to place on the expenditure on our
side of those particular activities. Um, can projects
involve Australia's oceanic partner countries? So I guess I
would reframe that question around. Can other countries not
listed in the in the global centres called Participate as
part of the call again, Paul and Karen.
I'm might leave this one for you to answer.
Alex, you can answer this one too. But
essentially Yes, of course. We are not to
tell how participant has to carry their research. Uh,
if another country expertise or collaborator based in another country
which is not part of the three country mentioned the
global central track one, uh, needs to be
Oh, of course. However, keep in mind
that the main thrust of the research should be actually
carry out in the in the for the three country
involved, which is Australia, Canada and the UK.
But, of course, you can bring in researcher
from other countries globally. Excellent. Um, and
is there an expectation from the Australian side around the
number of Australian partners that would be involved? So
is there a scenario in which CSIRO is involved,
but not leading a proposal or a proposal in which
there are multiple institutions from the Australian side participating?
This one might be for Ruth. Sorry, Alex.
Can I have that one again, please? Yes.
So the question is, can there be multiple institutions,
not including CSIRO necessarily being involved in an application.
Yes, they can. Yep. I could also
just provide a little bit more information about the eligible
activities in terms of the funding request. As per
the previous question. Um, just quickly run over
eligible expenditure. Um, salary support for Australian based
personnel, stipends for higher degree research students, travel
costs, expenditure on field research essential to the centre
limited equipment and its maintenance. Um, there'll be
further detail of that published shortly on the CSIRO NSF
Global Center's website, where will be providing some more
detailed guidelines about grant agreements and their arrangements. Excellent.
Thanks, Ruth, Um, and very aware that
some of the idiosyncrasies of those rules will be highly
relevant for some of the universities in terms of considering
how to participate. Another question. Is university or
industry co funding required, or will it be considered
favourably? Um, so I guess that's the question
of the way in which the merit assessment process considers
co investment co funding from from the industry sectors.
I mean, I think for NSF, we are
always, um, appreciative when PIs go
out and find additional funding to support to support their
work. Um but we are are agnostic in terms
of how, that way, certainly it would be,
you know, something good to see. But,
um, you know, the merit review is based
on, uh, NSF merit review criteria, which
is intellectual merit and then broader impacts. I could
just add to that, Alex that CSIRO would certainly
be. See it as being favourable if there was
co investment secured by Australian applicants. Excellent. Thanks.
Ruth and Paul. I'm not sure if you wanted
to add anything on that one. Does that the
beside the the NSF merits review, uh, intellectual
merit and, in fact, the solicitation. Specify
some, uh, specific solicitation criteria specific Christiania in
addition to So I really encourage, uh, people
here to go to the document and read this What
is expected, actually, and how the proposal will
be evaluated in terms of intellectual merit and broader impacts,
because some of the questions that has been asked are
answered in the document. Yeah, absolutely. Thanks,
Paul. Um, now, this is a question
which I'm going to direct to some of the mission
leads, which relates to whether there will be a
teaming partners list. Uh um, I think the
question is around. Will there be a teeming partners
list hosted by the NSF that shows interested US institutions?
And I'm not sure what the answer to that one
it will be, but also from a CSIRO side.
Will CSIRO list Australian institutions that might be interested in
participating? And so what I was going to do
for that one is throw to the mission leads to
kind of explain how they would envisage, I think,
the best way of forming some some potential partnerships and
collaborations. What would work best for you guys in
terms of seeing the highest quality applications come through?
We'd be happy to talk about existing connections, but
we wouldn't want to prejudice anyone reaching out to any
other part of the innovation system for what they thought
was most appropriate or things that sat outside our existing
relationships. So we're happy to help, but I
don't think I'd envisage putting up a list in case
that prejudices independent procurement type rules here. Thanks Michael
and Paul and Karen. I'm not sure whether that
you have specific rules or processes for that approach,
noting you have a slightly different yeah function on this
one, but No, I think the answer is
no to that one. Um, so, uh,
just having a look. A question about national laboratories
in the US particularly. I think one of the
questions has come up around NREL, but more generally,
uh, national institutions, national laboratories in the US
Eligible to participate as a partner from the U.
S side. I can take this one. So
national lab in the US are part of the government,
and NSF is also an executive branch of the government.
So the general rule is usually the government doesn't fund
the government. However, however, uh, if
there is really a need to bring in a researcher
from a national lab and as PI or a
co PI, uh, then you need to
contact a programme officer at NSF and ask if
that is possible. And if you make the case
that this is really mandatory for X or Y reason,
uh, then they can make an exception. But that
has to be made before using the product. So
in other words. Make sure to contact one
of the programme of Fisher at NSF and make sure
that you have an answer that they okay go ahead.
You can. You can include this particular researcher or,
uh, into your project. But as a general
rule, the government doesn't fund the government. So
usually, of course, these researcher in national can
participate to a global centre, uh, proposal and
project, but as no close collaborator. So as
long as NSF doesn't fund them, they can always
participate. Excellent. Um, as a question for
Ruth going back to clarifying the total funding that's available.
So we've talked about $7 million in total funding from
the Australian side. Um, that sounds like there's
$7 million to share amongst all applicants from the Australian
side. Is that correct? Um uh, And
what is the breakdown down in terms of the likely
number of projects that would be funded from the Australian
side? Given that so it's really going to depend
on what applicants are most highly recommended through the merit
review process And what funding bracket they've what funding amount
they've requested so will essentially be making the decision about
what we fund on the basis of the merit review.
Um and yes, the seven million will be the
total amount. So depending on what's recommended and what
we're able to fund within that bracket that will determine
the number of centres that we fund. Excellent.
Thank you. Um, a question from, uh,
from someone about CSIRO supporting ocean space work related to
climate change, fisheries and offshore wind energy. Um,
so work that would inform the sighting of offshore wind
energy that Steve, I think this one might be
a follow up from a question that was asked earlier
there might let you answer that one. Yes,
certainly. In scope for smart energy, the interactions
between environmental systems and the energy system so it could
be water resources. It could be climate change that
will form the backdrop of the future energy systems.
So those types of interactions between natural systems and our
engineered systems in scope. Excellent. Thanks, Steve.
Um, and a follow up question which has been
captured. But it's really important for us to be
really clear and explicit about this, given the unique
role that CSIRO is playing both as a funder of
this activity, but also being involved in, uh,
identifying potential research opportunities that are there. Um,
this does CSIRO need to be a research partner in
one of these calls. And conversely, could it
be the research funder, partner or participant? So
I might leave this one to Ruth to answer just
the way in which we're managing this particular issue.
Yeah, absolutely, Alex. So the answer is
most clearly no CSIRO does not have to be a
partner in a global centre application that involves Australian participants.
The applications can be from other parts of the research
system. Um, and there's no requirement to collaborate
directly with CSIRO. The requirement is about that alignment
to the mission nominated topics. Um, so yes,
it's true that it may be the case, however,
that CSIRO maybe an applicant, um, and a
grantee, um, and is also the funding agency
in this instance. Excellent. And now a question which
has come up a couple of times is if there's
a research topic that falls into two different streams that's
been identified. Uh, so we we've got those
six particular topics that we've identified that are of interest
to CSIRO and to the missions. How will that be
handled from an assessment process? Uh, the topic
falls between two different streams. So the requirement is
for alignment. So as long as there's a compelling
case for it, aligning to at least one of
those themes then that meets that eligibility criteria.
Um, if it aligns to more than one,
then you just need to make that clear in the
proposal as to what the different alignments are and how
it's delivering against the objectives of the multiple themes that
have been identified as, as related. Excellent.
Karen and Paul, I'll just give you a pause
in case you wanted to add anything from from your
perspective on that one. Actually, absolutely. If
if it's for, uh the intersection between climate change,
clean energy or, I mean what we are going
to look at it to the project as a whole
and how we can push the envelope and and how
the partnership will, you know, help build this
exciting research and as an outcome that have some foreseeable
benefits of society. So we're not too concerned about
you know where it's full again. Okay, so
I think on that particular one, it's definitely worth
having a look at the guidance material that CSIRO releases
from our perspective. So just to be really clear
on how you understand the when pulling your application together
the requirements from the CSIRO side versus the requirements from
the NSF side. Um, so that will be
something that you definitely need to consider in putting applications
together. Um, another question that I received I'm
interested to get some clarification on Is is it permissible
for a research intensive commercial entity to be a member
of a group submitting an application? And so I'm
going to hand to Ruth on that one. I
think that's an Australian side I'm going to suggest.
And just to reiterate the eligibility requirements, Yeah,
no problem. I'm just going to run over those
again as I've got them here verbatim, because anything
further than that, I'd probably prefer to answer the
question directly and know a little bit more about what
organisation the potential applicant is from. So we can
make sure that we're giving an accurate answer just to
reiterate the eligibility criteria again. It must be for
an Australia based university, as identified in table A or B
under the Higher Education Support Act or a corporate
commonwealth entity or publicly funded research agency or a cooperative
research centre. Um, so hopefully that does help
with that person's question. But if if they'd like
to clarify further, I'd really recommend contacting us by
email and letting us know a bit more about what
agency you're from. And we'll be able to give
you a bit more of a specific answer on that
basis. Excellent. Thanks, Ruth. Um,
so I might just see if we can answer one
more question, because I'm conscious that we're nearly at
time. Um, there's a question that we've come
from someone about whether there'll be another session midway through
the process. Uh, so in the lead up
to that, that may deadline where we provide additional
information or the opportunity for people to provide, um,
you know, follow up questions is there in the
thick of pulling those applications together? Um, I
would suggest that we will strongly consider having that opportunity
available for you to ask questions in a plenary.
Um, I have no doubt that we will have,
and we already have a number of questions that have
come through this very new process that we're undertaking.
Um and so what we will be doing is is
putting up some answers to frequently asked questions on our
side. And I'm sure that the NSF will also
have a process for dealing with frequently asked questions.
We very much encourage you to to send any questions
that you've got through, um, as early as
possible so that we can can try and deal with
them. Sometimes they require a bit of time to
to solve when they open a little bit of complexity,
particularly as this is a very new call. Um,
so I might take the opportunity to to finish up
and and thank everyone for joining us today. Uh,
in particular. I wanted to thank Paul and Karen.
I don't know exactly what time it is in the
US Um, that really do Thank you for taking
the time to be involved and actively responding to some
of the questions that we've received. Um, and
also to Ruth, uh, for leading off on
the discussions around the programme from the Australian side,
um, and also to our four mission leads who
have answered questions as we've gone through so very much
greatly appreciated. Um, and I wanted to thank
you again for those of you who have attended the
webinar. Um, and look forward to seeing the
way the global centres programme unfolds. in the coming
months, Um, there will be a post event
email that we will send out to people that have
registered their interest and who have joined, Um,
that will include a link to the recording of the
webinar. So you can have a look and review
the questions that were answered, um, again encourage
you to to send any questions in writing just to
avoid any ambiguity. It makes everyone's life a lot
easier. Um, there will also be, uh,
two. I believe it is webinars taking place one
from the US side, which I believe is tomorrow,
which will be focused around the U. S.
Participants. Um, and we'll make sure that some
information is available about that. But also, I
understand the UK will be holding an information session very
shortly as well. So we will make available the
details around those webinars so that you can join,
should you wish to to see what's happening from their
perspectives as well. Um, we have an email
address for inquiries, as I mentioned, which is
global applications at C.S.I.R.O dot au. Uh, please
send your questions into us. They're very happy to
to respond and engage. Um And so I very
much wanted to thank you all for taking the time
and wish you a great day or afternoon. So
thanks, everyone.