New housing estates often contain extensive wetland precincts, which could be reconsidered in future estates as homes for at-risk species. Picture: Supplied.
A Melbourne laboratory using Jurassic Park science to bring the Tasmanian tiger back from extinction believe they could also save endangered species from housing development.
And while they’ve already had investment from the likes of Hollywood superstars Chris, Liam and Luke Hemsworth, they believe property developers could be the missing link to saving a wide variety of bird and lizard species.
Colossal Biosciences Melbourne-based chief biology officer Andrew Pask said they expected to be able to safeguard endangered species in the path of housing developments in as little as 10-20 years, with samples already collected from growling grass frogs, legless lizards and other species that often prompt significant delays for housing estates.
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Describing the technology as almost the same concept used in Jurassic Park, he said he believed that in the next few decades conservation would become a fairly even split between protecting species, and reviving them with technology.
“You do still need those same conservation approaches we have, but they are not enough and we can see with the way the world is changing that we are losing this battle,” Mr Pask said.
“So we need to have more tools in our conservation toolkit.”
Rather than spend countless hours searching for the reclusive critters, Mr Pask said in the future a site could have its environmental DNA collected and used to preserve or reproduce the same conditions that were there before development — which could help preserve elusive species that were hard to locate in the wild.
Prof. Andrew Pask in the Colossal Australia laboratory at the University of Melbourne.
The thylacine skull that was used to harvest cells for the recreation of the Tasmanian Tiger.
“With the EDNA, environmental DNA, you get a much better snapshot of the ecosystem,” he said.
“And it can be done in days, rather than taking weeks or months to do those surveys.”
Once construction finished, their technology could then look at repopulating an area custom-designed for an endangered species, allowing work to build homes to start faster — and giving at risk species better odds of long-term survival.
Mr Pask said while de-extincting species like the Tasmanian tiger was one of their more prominent goals, the biggest impact they hoped to make was “saving those animals that are on the brink of extinction”.
“So this is actually the kind of way we would love to use the technology,” Mr Pask said.
“And we have been building a bank of cells of these animals so we can never lose any more diversity.
“So you can use the technology to rebuild resilient communities after we have broken them apart.”
The Hemsworth brothers Chris, Luke and Liam are all investors backing the technology.
The laboratory is working to revive the Tasmanian Tiger, but hopes to also help save species at risk of extinction — not just revive those that are already gone.
While he noted the technology to clone reptiles, amphibians and birds wasn’t as far advanced as it was for mammals, which had benefited from IVF research in humans, the timeline to producing endangered lizard or bird species was about 10-20 years — though this could speed up with partnerships with developers.
“We are working on the moa and the dodo (birds) … but it requires investment,” Mr Pask said.
“Developers could be the missing link into that funding.”
With Australia home to the world’s highest rate of mammal extinction in the world, he said it had a lot to gain from embracing de-extinction technology.
Villawood Properties founder Rory Costelloe said while he’d never thought of using technology to address the often significant delays around wildlife checks, and he would generally prefer “nature take its course”, he believed developers would be “quite happy as a cohort to do that”.
Mr Pask describes the technology as akin to that referenced in the hit Jurassic Park movies.
A striped legless lizard that is one of the most endangered species in the path of Melbourne’s new housing expansion. Picture: Craig Borrow.
“But you do have to have the habitat available, and some habitats won’t fit council rules and regulations,” Mr Costelloe said.
“But we are trying everything we can try, everywhere we can try it.
“And if they functionally work, we are happy to keep doing it.”
Mr Costelloe said another step that would allow for better development alongside protecting at risk species would be for town planners to take the time to identify important corridors to protect before a precinct structure plan was locked in and developers signed on for a piece of land.
The result would be developers would not be looking to use land that would be better suited to preserving endangered species.
“Then the developer is not paying for land they cannot develop, and so it will be cheaper to produce more homes,” Mr Costelloe said.
“Rather than fighting to get to use land after they pay for it.”
Housing estates like Villawood Properties’ award-winning Wandana estate come with plenty of open green space that could accommodate species after homes are built.
Villawood Properties founder Rory Costelloe believes natural and planning solutions would be best to boost housing supply, but says developers would likely back technology that can help.
Urban Development Institute of Australia Victorian executive director Linda Allison said it was exciting to see new options coming to the fore.
“The remaining parts of Melbourne’s greenfield landscape is becoming more complex and this is an example of those complex issues: how do we balance the goal of people having homes with saving biodiversity.”
“If there’s a technological solution to that, it is absolutely something we should be looking at.”
Ms Allison noted that uncertainty, like that around timelines for environmental studies and what they could uncover, was “like kryptonite” for developers.
“So if there’s a technology solution in the future that gives better certainty around the approval time frames and minimising timelines, we will look at that. The development industry is always looking at ways to reduce costs.”
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