Join our Citizen Science Network

Assist us with making a difference by contributing to our research

Citizen science is the involvement of the community in scientific research

The power of citizen science

Zero30 will be powered directly by research, with data provided from the community through its citizen science network.

Zero30 will provide the community with a platform to:

  • Participate in Zero30 science projects by collecting relevant data;
  • Provide data that will assist Zero30 in tracking the progress towards Climate Active Carbon Neutral Standard by 2030;
  • Provide data that will enable us to benchmark and monitor community adaptation and resilience.

Armidale Regional LGA household energy survey

This survey was developed to help estimate greenhouse gas emissions from Armidale Regional Local Government Area (LGA) household energy consumption methods and habits – information only our residents can provide. During 2021 – 2022 participants contributed to capturing robust emissions estimates that will help inform appropriate reduction and offset strategies to guide our collective transition to carbon neutrality. Please note this survey has now closed, stay tuned for future surveys.

About carbon tracking

Zero30 is a collaboration between the Armidale Regional Council, the University of New England, Business New England, Local Land Services and the broader regional community, supported by Verso Design. Zero30 will achieve certification of the Armidale Local Government Area through the Climate Active Carbon Neutral Standard for Precincts. The Climate Active Carbon Neutral Standard will help us to manage our greenhouse emissions and achieve our goal of carbon neutrality by 2030.

As part of our Zero30 Project, we have developed a suite of Carbon Tracking Tools to assist with calculating carbon emissions and identifying associated activities. We are excited to have built a tracker which is simple to use and relevant to our regional Australian farming community.

A farmer can input data for multiple farms, decide which outputs are relevant to a particular farm and enter relevant numbers to calculate the direct (Scope 1) emissions which are presented as a table and graphed.

We are looking forward to helping our farmers determine and track their farms’ carbon footprint, and equally excited that you will be able to contribute your data directly to our research.

We wish to acknowledge the University of Melbourne’s Primary Industries Climate Challenges Centre (PICCC) and reference the Beef (B-GAF) Farm Greenhouse Accounting Framework Tool, which is freely available as MS Excel spreadsheets, (D-GAF) Dairy GHG Accounting Framework V13.

Beef Farmer Carbon Tracking Tool

Developing our carbon tracking data tool

Version 1 of the Beef Farmer Carbon Tracker Tool was developed in 2020 by regional students, under the supervision of Project Zero30 with support from Verso Design. Four UNE Computer Science 3rd year students took up the development team opportunity to apply their skills to an industry issue within their studies.  We are delighted to introduce the development team:

Russel Knight

Russell is a 29 year old studying at UNE online from Melbourne. He is currently undertaking his final trimester of a Bachelor of Computer Science, with aspirations of continuing into a graduate software development program once complete.

Chris Hollman

I’m a 3rd and final year external student based out of Brisbane, QLD currently studying a Bachelor of Computer Science. I returned to study after completing ~7 years with the Queensland Police, looking to challenge myself at university by formally studying my longtime passion for computers. Outside of university I enjoy doing statistical analysis and forecasting of sports, playing guitar, and keeping fit.

Blake Hamilton

My name is Blake Hamilton. I live in Newcastle NSW and I’m a third year UNE student studying a bachelor of Computer Science.

Andrew Grimm

I work as a full stack web developer for IMB bank. Prior to this I worked in China for 5 years. I like working on projects that have a material impact on peoples lives.

Version 2 of the Beef Farmer Carbon Tracker Tool was developed in 2021 by David Miron.

Associate-Professor David Miron
Project Lead on behalf of the University of New England

David is the UNE Zero30 Project Lead, as well as the Director Strategic Research Initiatives at the University of New England, Armidale. David has a PhD in Computer Science, and a passion for pursuing research outcomes which provide benefit to regional communities, farmers and local businesses.

About our Post-Doctoral Research Fellow Md. Noor E Alam Siddique

Siddique has a background in soil science and agriculture with particular interest in soil carbon and sustainable land management. He has a PhD in soil carbon dynamics from the University of New England. He investigated the influence of land resource and land use intensity on soil carbon in rice-based cropping systems to find pathways of land use intensification, soil resilience, climate change adaptations and sustainability in a farming region. He holds a bachelor’s degree in agriculture and two master’s degrees, one in horticulture from Bangladesh and the other in physical land resources from the Ghent University in Belgium. He worked for the Bangladeshi Government in the Ministry of Agriculture as a scientific officer in agricultural development activities, farmer advisory services and regional land survey programs. Siddique is also passionate about land resource inventory and spatio-temporal datasets, as well as the role of landholders in carbon sequestration initiatives to improve productivity, environmental protection and social well-being. Read more about Siddique here.

Student Project Team

Spencer

Spencer is finishing his final unit for his Bachelor of Computer Science. He currently manages a public-sector pharmaceutical manufacturing facility and has a strong interest in the use of software and technology for computer-assisted decision-making.

Bryce Watson

Bryce is a student at the University of New England, studying a Bachelor of Computer Science. Bryce has spent the first couple years of his degree studying on campus and living in Armidale but now has moved back to the northern rivers area to complete his studies online. Throughout his study, Bryce has gained experience with a wide array of technologies working on many different Software and Data Science projects. As part of his capstone project in his final year of study in 2023, he has been involved in a team of students who are contributing to improvements and fixes for both the Beef and Sheep carbon tracker tools.

Leigh Dayes

Leigh is currently studying a Bachelor of Computer Science at the University of New England. Since 2010, he has been employed as an Electronics Technician in The Australian Defence Force. He was born and raised in rural North Queensland, so given the opportunity to work on the Carbon Tracking Tool and assist farmers is a challenge he is looking forward to.

Mitchell Downs

Mitchell works as a Senior Security Analyst for a medium sized cyber security company that works within both private and government environments. He is currently completing his final unit of a Bachelor of Computer Science (Data Science and Software Development) while also holding a number of industry certifications in cyber security, such as GCIA and GCDA. Prior to his work in private industry, Mitchell spent 13 years within the Australian Army. He grew up in the Central West region of NSW before spending time in Newcastle, Wodonga, far north Queensland, Syndey and now Melbourne. He works daily with a number of different programming/scripting languages, and across dozens of tools.

Martin Schreiber

Martin is a final year computer science student at University of New England, Armidale. His interests include mathematics, data science and machine learning. Martin has experience in website and mobile app development, as well as project management as part of Australian based acrobatics company Gravity and Other Myths.