About APER

Who We Are

Asia Pacific Environmental Response (APER) is a small specialised company with a team of highly experienced oiled wildlife and environmental responders.

APER’s team includes wildlife experts, expert mariners, chemists, ecologists and specialists in incident response who have been responding to marine and terrestrial incidents for over two decades.

APER’s wildlife experts have experience in supporting threatened and impacted wildlife including avian fauna (shorebirds, seabirds and penguins), marine mammals (seals, dugong and cetaceans) and marine reptiles (turtles, crocodiles and sea snakes).

We have a proven history of supporting oiled wildlife responses, ship grounding incidents, oil and chemical marine spills, introduced marine pest outbreaks, vehicle and train spills, industrial facility spills and industrial fires.

APER is currently recognised nationally and internationally as the leading oiled wildlife response organisation in Australia because of its proven experience.

Principle Consultant

Michael Short is the Principal Consultant and Director of APER. He has been involved in oiled wildlife response in polar, temperate and tropical environments having worked with oiled birds, oiled marine mammals and oiled marine reptiles since 1993. He is the recipient of a Churchill Fellowship (2000) where he investigated oiled wildlife response contingency planning, training and response systems for avian fauna, marine mammal and marine reptiles in the USA and Canada.

He is frequently invited to assist in oiled wildlife responses around the world supporting industry, government and non-government organizations in planning, training, exercising and response support. Michael has also been providing environmental advice and technical support to environmental incidents since 1991 for both marine and terrestrial incidents. He has a Master’s Degree in Tropical Marine Ecology and a Bachelor of Applied Science in Natural Resource Management.