History

In 2013, a number of control room stakeholders attended a Control Room Design and Operation conference in Sydney. It was unique and important and filled a room with 80 people. It was a forum which involved operators, managers, designers, human factors and ergonomics. It held the interest of representatives from oil, gas, electrical generation and distribution, market operators, transport, tunnels, mining and infrastructure; educators and researchers; consultants and trade vendors. It was a forum which had not been convened before in Australia.

It was held again in Sydney in 2014 and Melbourne in 2015.

It was evident that delegates wanted participation and representation – a members organisation which would continue to provide and manage a members’ forum to support the control room industry.

Following the 2015 conference a few individuals created the Australian Control Rooms Network – a LinkedIn group – which provided an ongoing forum. They designed and produced OZCORONET 2016 – the group’s self-organised three day conference in Brisbane. Not only was the content professional and unusual, but the vitality and networking proved the appetite for this forum. The presentations included live theatre safety training with actors; eight case studies, international presenters and delegates; and eight facility site visits with an insights and lessons learnt panel session back at the conference with the site visit hosts. The Brisbane conference closed with the 73 registered participants voting to sustain this forum and to formalise it.

The Australian Control Room Network Association was registered with ASIC on the 9th November 2017. An Association committee was established with the main aims to seek corporate membership and to hold a conference in mid to late 2018.