9-arcsecond gridded HCAS 2.3 (2001-2018) base model estimation of habitat condition for terrestrial biodiversity, ecosystem site condition, annual epochs and 18-year trends for continental Australia

This data collection comprises, for continental Australia, 9-arcsecond gridded HCAS version 2.3 (2001-2018) base model (v2.3) estimation of habitat condition for terrestrial biodiversity, an inferred local pressures subindex using the HCAS v2.3 as an input, ecosystem site condition derived from HCAS v2.3 and the inferred local pressures analysis, 18 annual epochs and trends (2001 to 2018), and a series of ancillary datasets to support their use. HCAS v2.3 builds on and updates HCAS v2.1. Minimal enhancements included: • refined reference sites used as representative benchmarks for estimating habitat condition as the proximity to reference (high levels of ecosystem integrity); • revised scaling algorithm used to calibrate habitat condition in the range 0.0 (lowest) to 1.0 (highest); • development of ecosystem site condition by incorporating the effects of inferred local pressures; • a trend analysis based on 18 annual epochs (2001 to 2018) with consideration given to temporal auto-correlation effects; • evaluation of the results (detailed in the accompanying technical report); • a technical report documenting these changes and enhancements and comparison with HCAS v2.1. Other aspects of the HCAS v2.1 modelling process remained the same. A product brief provided with this collection summarises the included datasets. Guidance on how to use the data are provided in the accompanying technical report (Extended methods used in developing the Habitat Condition Assessment System (HCAS) version 2.3, ecosystem condition account-ready data and experimental accounts for the Flinders, Norman and Gilbert river catchments in Queensland and the Western Australian Wheatbelt) and ecosystem accounting application examples (see related data collections).