About

The Federal Budget handed down in August 1977, contained an amount of $4 million in the Department of Science allocations for the establishment of facilities in Australia to receive, archive, process and distribute data from the NASA Landsat Satellite Program.

In 1979 the Australian Landsat Station (ALS) became operational and became National Mapping's responsibility in 1984 in an effort to make the data more widely accessible.

The ALS was renamed the Australian Centre for Remote Sensing (ACRES) in 1986 to reflect its expansion to receive data from other remote sensing satellites. Under National Mapping ACRES grew and expanded acquiring an impressive archive of data which it carefully managed to ensure its continued availability despite technology changes.

ACRES as part of National Mapping went to Geoscience Australia in 2001 and is now the National Earth and Marine Observations Group.