Australia Is Not Prepared For Growing Natural Disasters, Experts Warn

NEWS.com.au - Gavin Fernando

SORRY, folks. The news is not good. This weather is only getting more extreme, natural disasters are getting increasingly more deadly, and we puny humans seem pretty content to sit back and accept our murky fate.
The World Bank has issued a warning to major cities around the world that we're underprepared for major risks from extreme weather and other hazards, which will only intensify due to population growth and surging migration.
By 2050, 1.3 billion people and $AU217 trillion in assets will be affected by worsening river and coastal floods alone.
The report says many city officials have no clear idea of the range of disaster risks they face and how serious they could be.
A combination of sea-level rise and sinking of coastal cities, including from excessive extraction of the groundwater, could drive disaster losses in 136 coastal cities from $US6 billion a year ($A8.1b) in 2010 to $US1 trillion a year by 2070.
In Indonesia, for instance, chances of flooding from overflowing rivers is expected to grow 166 per cent over the next 30 years, while coastal flooding risk could rise 445 per cent.
Nepal's capital Kathmandu could see a 50 per cent rise in earthquake risk by 2045 as more slums and informal buildings go up.
Overall, the message is clear: parts of the world are pretty screwed.

What does this mean for australia?
The report identified rising sea levels, extreme heat and drought as some of the biggest natural disasters that will affect Australia over coming years.
"Sea-level rise is an extremely important influence on evolving hazard," it says.
"It contributes more to increased storm tide heights in Victoria, Australia, than higher wind speeds. This suggests that storm surge risk is likely to increase under climate change, despite the remaining uncertainty around regional changes in cyclone frequency and intensity."
The report also stressed the importance of addressing extreme heatwaves, which Australia, of course, is renowned for. It warned that, since they're already a prime driver of mortality, and since long-duration temperature extremes lead to drought, this could trigger climate-related human migration.

Australia is already seeing an increase in its number of heatwaves. Source: BOM

While we're reasonably lucky when it comes to hazards like earthquakes and volcanoes, we're already seeing an increase in the number of heatwaves.
Dr Sarah Perkins-Kirkpatrick, a research fellow at UNSW's Climate Change Research Centre, told news.com.au that many people don't seem to realise that heatwaves have killed more people than any other natural disaster, so much so that she dubbed it the "silent killer".
"By 2050, this will have huge implications for public health and infrastructure," she said. By 2050, Sydney and Perth can expect 15 more heatwaves per season, with Melbourne and Adelaide between five and 10.
She said that heatwaves get more frequent going north, but more intense going south, meaning the whole country is more or less affected one way or another.
Meanwhile, The Bureau of Meteorology and CSIRO project the number of extreme fire weather days will grow in southern and eastern Australia by 100 and 300 per cent by 2050 compared to 1980 to 1999.

What are heatwaves?

Dr Perkins-Kirkpatrick stressed that a key part of the problem was Australia's attitude to heatwaves, and climate change more broadly.
"There's this whole culture where we're like 'Just suck it up'," she said. "We need a culture shift. You look at the trade industry where people are on rooftops building houses in 40 degree heat, because if they don't work they don't get paid. We need to take heatwaves more seriously, accept that it's happening, so we can change the course of the century."

Extreme heatwaves will be a growing problem for Australia over the next few decades. Source: News Corp Australia

She warned that on the east coast residents of western Sydney would be the most vulnerable. It's the hottest part of the city, being further away from the ocean, and a hotspot for rapid population growth.
Reports in the past few years have estimated that Australia's population will reach 42 million by 2050, with about eight million of these people living in Sydney. The World Bank said there's a correlation between population growth and natural disasters.
Earlier this year, the Australian Business Roundtable for Disaster Resilience and Safer Communities predicted that our nation's natural disaster bill will triple to $33 billion by 2050, which is 50 per cent greater than previous estimates.
This was based not only on the physical impact of natural disasters, but the social impacts such as mental health issues, chronic disease and alcohol misuse as a result.
Australian Red Cross Director of Australian Services, Noel Clement, said this filled a critical gap in the research on medium and long-term impact of disasters on Australian communities.
"Governments, business and communities need to work together to address the medium and long-term social impacts of natural disasters through further investment and research into community resilience programs," he said.
Dr Perkins-Kirkpatrick shared this view.
"The Budget barely mentioned climate change — that speaks volumes," she said.
"The CSIRO debacle speaks volumes too.
"We need to adapt. We need to prepare our hospitals so they can be ready when a heatwave occurs. We need education for the elderly, who are the most vulnerable to heatwaves. We need to shift towards mitigation and adaptation."

The world is underprepared for natural hazards, and Australia is not immune. Source: News Limited

In the 2016 Budget, it was announced that the Clean Energy Finance Corporation (CEFC) and the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA) would refocus their activities "towards the government's innovation agenda".
The CEFC will be responsible for allocating $1 billion in existing funding over 10 years to establish a Clean Energy Innovation Fund. The fund will provide money to assist emerging clean energy technology become commercially viable. The fund will be jointly managed by ARENA, which will also continue to manage its existing portfolio through the new fund.

Climate change at the centre of this year's election.

Environment groups, such as the Australian Conservation Foundation and the Australian Youth Climate Coalition, expressed their disappointment with the government's response to tackling climate change in the Budget, with the latter pointing out that the "Budget provides no new funding for renewable energy".
Regardless, Dr Perkins-Kirkpatrick said we're already locked in for a set amount of change by 2050, meaning that, even if we did take drastic measures to lower our carbon emissions, we wouldn't be free from the effects of what's already been done.
That's a scary thought.