ACCESS-NRI Merit Allocation Guidelines

1. Introduction

ACCESS-NRI currently receives resources for compute and storage directly from the National Computational Infrastructure (NCI) , funded by the Australian Government’s National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy (NCRIS). ACCESS-NRI will use these resources to support model development and test runs for ACCESS-NRI staff, as well as to support community members to undertake scientific simulations using ACCESS models and share community reference datasets.
This document outlines the criteria for distributing compute and storage resources to the ACCESS Community Working Groups (WGs) to maximise the benefit and impact of the available resource.

2. Total Allocations
Total storage resources available for FY 2024-2025.

Total Compute (MSU) Total Storage (TB)

Community Working Groups (WGs) 600

Reference datasets 1200

ACCESS-NRI Staff (development/testing) 200

TOTAL 50 * 2000

	Total Compute (MSU)	Total Storage (TB)
Community Working Groups (WGs)		600
Reference datasets		1200
ACCESS-NRI Staff (development/testing)		200
TOTAL	50 *	2000

*Total compute is 50 MSU, which are typically allocated to ACCESS-NRI staff and WGs around 50% each. This arrangement has some flexibility with the oversight of the Scientific Advisory Committee (SAC).

Note that the total storage resources available for reference datasets is expected to increase to 2200TB by 2026-2027.

3. Allocation Process

3.1 Community Working Groups

The ACCESS-NRI merit allocation scheme for WG resources will operate as follows:

Each community WG will be allocated a project code on NCI with compute and storage resources.
WG Co-chairs along with the ACCESS-NRI Liaison will be designated as Lead CIs for this project code. For notification purposes within the MyNCI User Portal, the WG Co-chairs will be designated as Delegate Lead CIs.
Membership requests will be reviewed by the WG Co-chairs.
- Users requesting access project resources will be required to join the associated WG within the ACCESS-Hive Forum to be approved. Instructions on joining WGs can be found here.
- As part of the NCI Conditions of Use, all users must comply with the Defence Trade Controls Act. WG Co-chairs should consult with the ACCESS-NRI Liaison before approving any membership requests from overseas institutions.
Every 6 months, WG Co-chairs will be asked to work with their community to specify a plan for simulations over the next two quarters, including a table showing estimated compute use and storage requirements. ACCESS-NRI will provide a template to assist with this planning.
- Plans should also explicitly include anticipated requests for storage to cover reference datasets produced by these simulations. Further information on the process to request support for reference datasets can be found in the following section.
- In addition to specific requests, WGs are expected to reserve at least 5% of their allocation each quarter that may be distributed for small needs (new users, testing, ECRs) at the discretion of the Co-chairs
These plans will be evaluated by the ACCESS-NRI Scientific Advisory Committee (SAC) according to the below assessment criteria (Section 4). The role of the SAC will also be to identify opportunities for WGs to coordinate around shared needs and/or to avoid possible duplication
At the end of each financial year the Working Group Co-Chairs and ACCESS-NRI Liaison will be required to report on the scientific impact and use of computational resources, as well as total usage by FOR code(s) and by organisation. ACCESS-NRI will provide a template to assist with reporting.

Please note:

Allocations are not transferable to other NCI projects outside of the ACCESS-NRI scheme.
When nearing the end of each quarter, WG Co-chairs have flexibility to ensure their compute allocation is fully used. This could include sharing unused compute with other WGs or directly approving (or increasing existing) compute allocations within the WG at their discretion.
Allocations cannot be deferred to future allocation periods without approval from ACCESS-NRI and the Scientific Advisory Committee (SAC).
Storage (/g/data) allocations are not intended for long-term storage (e.g., exceeding 4 quarters). Data intended for sharing and reuse will be supported by a separate dedicated storage allocation (see next section and this page for details on how to request support).
Above guidelines and resources may change subject to NCRIS funding agreements.

3.2 Reference Datasets

Reference datasets are those that are used by community members to undertake scientific research, support model development and/or will be shared for reuse. All reference datasets require at least some level of curation, documentation and management to meet the requirements of the FAIR and CARE Principles.

Members of the ACCESS Community can request support for reference datasets from ACCESS-NRI. All requests will be assessed according to the criteria outlined in Section 4.

Please refer to the ACCESS-NRI Merit Allocations for Reference Datasets information page for more details on how to request support for reference datasets.

4.Assessment Criteria

The criteria for prioritising ACCESS-NRI merit resources are to maximise:

Alignment with ACCESS development pathways OR software and tools (30%)

Priority will be given to requests which contribute to the ongoing development of new ACCESS configurations, or to enhance existing configurations.
- Reference datasets: Priority will be given to requests which contribute to the uptake or enhancement of supported ACCESS model configurations, model evaluation and data analysis tools.

Contribution to community (30%)

Priority will be given to requests which will contribute to a broad user base, preferably from multiple organisations. This criterion will also take into account the value of distributing resource to new users, or early career researchers who are unable to support simulations from other means.

National benefit and impact (25%)

Priority will be given to simulations that address science priorities that are aligned with national benefit and will maximise the impact of ACCESS development, software, data and tools.

Computational Feasibility (15%)

The cost of compute and storage, value of the investment, the efficiency of the computations to be used and the feasibility of the plan to remove the data at the end of the project will be considered in distributing resources.
- Reference datasets: The cost of storage and data management support, value of the investment, the compliance with relevant data standards, licensing, and the feasibility of the plan to transition or retire datasets at the end of the project will be considered in distributing resources.

5. Governance

To help the WG Co-chairs and ACCESS-NRI Liaison manage project resources, the ACCESS-NRI will
provide:

Request template to help plan WG compute and storage allocations
Request template for reference datasets
Monitoring tools for NCI resources
Reporting template to help with the reporting requirements

6. Conditions of Use

All WG Co-chairs and members of the WG granted resources should review and comply with NCI’s terms and conditions of access: https://nci.org.au/users/nci-terms-and-conditions-access#Terms

Providers of reference datasets should review and acknowledge the ACCESS-NRI Merit Allocation for Reference Datasets.

7. Acknowledgement

ACCESS community members who make use of these resources are required to acknowledge ACCESSNRI and NCI in their outputs. The following are examples of acknowledgement templates:

“This research was supported by the Australian Government’s National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy (NCRIS), with access to computational resources provided through the ACCESS-NRI Merit Allocation Scheme and the National Computational Infrastructure (NCI).”

“This data is supported by the Australian Government’s National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy (NCRIS), with access to resources provided through the ACCESS-NRI Merit Allocation Scheme and the National Computational Infrastructure (NCI).”