‘Extreme’ summer a sign of things to come
SYDNEY — Climate change was responsible for breaking more than 200 Australian weather records over the past three months, researchers said on Wednesday, a glimpse of conditions to come that will likely threaten energy security and agriculture.
Much of the country’s east coast endured its hottest summer on record, the independent Climate Council said, while torrential rain in Western Australia caused flash flooding.
“These are rates of change and temperatures that are so high that the environment can’t cope with or adapt fast enough,” said Will Steffen, professor of environmental studies, Australian National University and lead author of the Climate Council report, on Wednesday.
“If you look at the east of Australia, particularly New South Wales and Queensland, the records that have been tumbling there are heatwavetype records, but over in the west, in Perth and up in the Kimberley, they’ve been setting extreme rainfall records.”
The sort of unseasonable conditions seen between Dec 1 and Feb 28 would likely be recurring regularly in future, the council said.
“I would say by 2025 or 2030, the odds are we will see another hot summer record set in Sydney and in other places,” Steffen said.
The expected climate will strain the country’s energy sector, the council said, threatening yet more blackouts.
Power outages
Australia saw several power outages in different parts of he country after temperatures soared regularly above 40 C, with demand for air conditioning strained supplies.
“We’ ll see even more records set in five and 10 years’ time and that’s because of the momentum in the climate system. Even if we could magically cut emissions to zero tomorrow, we would still have another decade or two where the climate plays out its built-in momentum,” Steffen said.
Australia’s changing climate also threatens one of the main pillars of its economy, with agricultural production vulnerable.
“A really bad year can just demolish crop yields,” said Phin Ziebell, agribusiness economist, at the National Australia Bank.
Australia exported a record $38 billion worth of agricultural produce last year, government data shows, which helped soften the blow of a slowdown in its dominant mining sector.
The Climate Council report came days after another independent report warned the impact of climate change had caused permanent damage to Australia’s environment.
Australian scientists said recently mass coral bleaching, caused by climate change, has destroyed at least 35 percent of the northern and central Great Barrier Reef.
We’ll see even more records set in five and 10 years’ time and that’s because of the momentum ...” Will Steffen, professor of environmental studies of the northern and central Great Barrier Reef has been destroyed by climate change.