(AU SBS) Climate Change A Security Threat: Report

SBS - AAP

A new report by former defence and security leaders suggests climate change presents a clear and present danger to the world's collective security.

A new report by former defence and security leaders suggests climate change presents a clear and present danger to the world's collective security. Source: Getty

Australia's 2020 bushfires have been showcased in a new global report as an example of the security risk from climate change.

The World Climate and Security Report, released on Monday by the International Military Council on Climate and Security, looks at the threats posed by the convergence of climate change with other global risks, like COVID-19.

It also examines the intensification of climate risks, with new disasters hitting before communities can recover from or adapt to previous ones.

"Fragile regions of the world will continue to face the most severe and catastrophic security consequences of climate change, yet no region is immune, as demonstrated - for example - by the unprecedented wildfires in the United States and Australia in 2020," the report says.

Evacuees from Mallacoota, Victoria, being transported on a landing craft to Royal Australian Navy (RAN) MV Sycamore during bushfire relief efforts. Source: AAP / Royal Australian Navy

The COVID-19 pandemic showed many countries were unprepared to manage multiple crises simultaneously.

As well, the report points out militaries will be increasingly overstretched as climate change intensifies.

"As the pace and intensity of extreme weather events increases, countries are increasing their reliance on military forces as first responders.

"While direct climate change effects regularly threaten military infrastructure and threaten to reduce readiness, the most pressing security threats will come from climate change-induced disruptions to social systems."

Former Australian defence chief Chris Barrie, who is part of the Australian Security Leaders Climate Group, said addressing the link between climate and security risk should be a priority.

"This new report reiterates that climate change presents a clear and present danger to our collective security," he said.

"Climate change is already harmfully impacting security environments, infrastructure, institutions, lives and livelihoods.

"A growing number of world leaders, including US President (Joe) Biden, are recognising climate change is an existential security threat and prioritising action on climate and security.

"However, in our region we have yet to come to terms with climate security risks. Australia is being left behind our closest ally and European nations."

Audio: Admiral (ret) Chris Barrie, former Chief of the Defence Force; executive member of the Australian Security Leaders Climate Group. Source Radio National Breakfast

The group says the federal government should commit to an urgent and comprehensive whole-of-nation climate and security risk assessment.

A survey of security experts, which formed part of the report, found that while "water security" was the issue deemed to be most risky this year, the top issue would switch to "ecosystem security" in 2031 and "national security" in 2041.

The report cites a wide range of examples of climate action taken by governments which could at the same time improve security.

"For instance, a land restoration project may be initiated as a climate adaptation effort, but concurrently create a new carbon sink (mitigation), new opportunities for food production and new livelihoods, and thereby an alternative to joining a local militia."

Climate and security will both be on the agenda of the G7 summit in the UK, which Prime Minister Scott Morrison will attend this weekend as a guest.

Links

• (AU Video) ABC 7.30 Special: Climate Emergency
• (AU SMH) Military Leaders, Security Chiefs Demand Action On Climate Threat
• (AU SMH) Climate Change A Security Threat In Australia, Says Intelligence Expert
• (AU) Climate Change Is A Security Threat The Government Keeps Ignoring. We’ll Show Up Empty Handed To Yet Another Global Summit
• (USA) Intelligence Forecast Sees A Post-Coronavirus World Upended By Climate Change And Splintering Societies
• (AU) Climate Change ‘A National Security Threat’: Report
• Climate Change 'The Biggest Security Threat Ever Faced By Modern Humans', David Attenborough Warns

(The Conversation) Climate Change: World’s Lakes Are In Hot Water – Threatening Rare Wildlife

The Conversation - Antonia Law

Jdross75/Shutterstock

Author Antonia Law is Lecturer in Physical Geography, Keele University

The Earth’s surface is splotched with 117 million lakes. Some are scarcely more than ponds, while others are so big they can be seen from space.

At 395 miles long, 49 miles wide and just over 1 mile deep, Lake Baikal in Siberia is one of the world’s largest and it’s home to 2,500 species, including the Baikal seal – Earth’s only species of freshwater seal.

Lakes and rivers occupy just 1% of the Earth’s surface but are incredible hotspots for biodiversity, sheltering 10% of all species globally. Particularly in older and deeper lakes, life has had millions of years to evolve and adapt to the peculiarities of that habitat, giving rise to unique forms.

But since 1970, numbers of freshwater vertebrates, including birds, fish, amphibians, reptiles and mammals, have declined by a staggering 83% through the extraction of lake water, pollution, invasive species and disease. Now, climate change threatens to drive even deeper losses.

Lake heatwaves – when surface water temperatures rise above their average for longer than five days – are a relatively new phenomenon. But by the end of this century, heatwaves could last between three and 12 times longer and become 0.3°C to 1.7°C hotter.

In some places, particularly near the equator, lakes may enter a permanent heatwave state. Smaller lakes may shrink or disappear entirely, along with the wildlife they contain, while deeper lakes will face less intense but longer heatwaves.

Lake Baikal’s age and depth has thrown up several evolutionary quirks. Nature Picture Library/Alamy Stock Photo

In a new study, researchers examined 393 lakes worldwide between 1981 and 2017 and found their temperatures rose by 0.39°C every decade, while dissolved oxygen fell by 5% at the surface and 19% in the depths.

It’s in these cooler, deeper parts of lakes where trout, burbot and salmon usually thrive thanks to sufficient oxygen, especially in the summer. Largely due to warming air temperatures, 68% of the lakes in the study had lost this important niche to rising temperatures and falling oxygen levels.

So what do these changes mean for the other forms of life that call lakes home?

How lake life will change

Most organisms that live in lakes can only thrive in water with just the right temperature and concentration of nutrients and oxygen. Warmer lakes hold less oxygen and lose more water through evaporation, forcing species to live in saltier and less oxygenated habitats.

Things won’t be easy for species which live above the water for most of their lives either. Dragonflies are a common sight flitting among the reeds on the lake side. They lay their eggs in the shallows, but as lakes are lowered or dry out during more frequent and severe heatwaves, this protection is lost. Those larvae which survive are likely to emerge early, when food and habitat may be lacking.

Climate change will shift the types of organisms we find in lakes. Cold water fish, such as trout and salmon, need cooler temperatures and higher oxygen concentrations than warm water species such as largemouth bass and white perch. One cold-loving species, Arctic char, could vanish from 73% of its Swedish range by 2100 just as a result of warming.

Meanwhile, rising temperatures could mean parasites that infect fish grow faster and larger. In one study, parasitic worms infecting stickleback fish grew four times faster in water at 20°C compared to 15°C.

Heatwaves could accelerate the spread and size of pathogens in fish, with huge consequences for the aquaculture industry and wild populations. Human diseases, transmitted by freshwater organisms, may also increase.

Naegleria fowleri is a lake parasite that flourishes in warmer temperatures. Known as the brain-eating amoeba, this microbe can cause fatal meningoencephalitis if it enters the body through the nose. Prolonged periods when lake waters remain warmer than average could see this parasite expand into more temperate waters.

Since warmer surface waters hold more nutrients, climate change could cause an explosion in the number of microscopic algae that live in lakes. These microorganisms are the base of the food web and the foundation of life in these habitats. But this isn’t the good news it seems.

When nutrients are abundant, huge quantities of these algae can form a thick green (or sometimes red) blanket on the lake surface. These algal blooms not only look unsightly, they often produce harmful toxins.

Heatwaves are increasing the frequency of harmful algal blooms and causing mass mortality events where thousands of animals die in a few days. Algal blooms block out the light and suffocate fish, either by crashing oxygen levels or clogging up their gills. A 100 metre-wide, 15cm-deep algal bloom in Loch Leven in Scotland in 1992 killed 1,000 brown trout over 24 hours.

Lake algal blooms are likely to be more frequent and severe as Earth warms. O Partime Photo/Shutterstock

Unlike those living elsewhere, most lake animals cannot simply move to another habitat once their lake becomes uninhabitable. But even migratory species will suffer. In August 2004, 15,000 flamingos died on a lake in Tanzania after consuming toxins produced by algal blooms.

As heatwaves proliferate and oxygen levels decline, mass fish die-offs are predicted to double from the 2040s in lakes in the northern hemisphere and increase fourfold in the southern hemisphere from the 2080s onwards.

Without immediate action to curb emissions and slow climate change, many of the world’s lakes are on course for a sweltering, breathless and lifeless future.

Links

• Widespread deoxygenation of temperate lakes
• (The Guardian) Climate Crisis Is Suffocating The World’s Lakes, Study Finds 
• Lake Baikal: how climate change is threatening the world’s oldest, deepest lake
• Floating solar farms could cool down lakes threatened by climate change
• Lake Poopó: why Bolivia’s second largest lake disappeared – and how to bring it back
• Africa’s most toxic lakes are a paradise for fearless flamingos

(Forbes) Climate Change Could Batter World’s Wealthiest Economies Twice As Badly As Covid, Oxfam Says

Forbes - Carlie Porterfield

G7 countries will lose $5tn a year by 2050 if temperatures rise by 2.6C

Ocean Rebellion protesters portrayed Prime Minister Boris Johnson and an oil company’s archetypal corporate shill over the weekend in Cornwall. In Pictures via Getty Images

The world’s seven richest countries are in danger of losing nearly $5 trillion a year within the next three decades over the catastrophic results of climate change, British charity Oxfam said Monday, a loss double that of the damage done by the coronavirus pandemic.

Ocean Rebellion protesters portrayed Prime Minister Boris Johnson and an oil company’s archetypal corporate shill over the weekend in Cornwall. In Pictures via Getty Images

Key Facts

• G7 countries can expect to count an average GDP shrinkage of 8.5% annually by 2050 if existing climate change trends continue, according to an Oxfam analysis of Swiss Re Institute research.
  
  
• The coronavirus pandemic, which triggered widespread unemployment, sharp drops in spending and record stimulus packages, only saw those seven countries’ GDP drop by an average of 4.2%.
  
  
• Oxfam pointed out that, unlike the coronavirus pandemic, the economy won’t “bounce back” from the damage brought on by climate change—researchers project its economic effects will only grow worse each year.
  
  
• Climate change could adversely affect the economy through an increase in storms, floods and droughts, which could result in mass human migration, property damage, trade disruptions and falling productivity, according to the Swiss Re Institute. 
  
  
• Poorer countries are even worse off, according to Oxfam: India could lose 27% of its economy by 2050, and the GDP of the Republic of the Philippines could shrink by 35% within the same time frame.

“The climate crisis is already devastating lives in poorer countries, but the world’s most developed economies are not immune,” Oxfam GB CEO Danny Sriskandarajah said in a statement Monday.

Big Number

132 million. That’s how many additional people worldwide could be forced into extreme poverty between now and 2030 over climate change, according to the World Bank.

What To Watch For

Oxfam is calling for G7 countries to strengthen their climate action goals and cut more carbon. The move would have economic benefits, according to Oxfam. While current projections show the U.K. economy shrinking by 6.5% by 2050, the country could reduce damage to a 2.4% slide if G7 countries were to shift gears to better follow the Paris Agreement.

Key Background

The world’s seven richest countries are slated to come together this week in Cornwall, England, for the first in-person G7 Summit since the onset of the coronavirus pandemic. 

While the United States, Japan, Germany, Britain, France, Italy and Canada have all set carbon emission goals, most fall short of necessary adjustments that will keep global warming below 1.5°C, the level outlined in the Paris Agreement that experts say would trigger catastrophic climate change, according to Oxfam. 

A study released in March found that the world would need the equivalent of a coronavirus lockdown every two years to meet the goals set forth in the Paris Agreement. The U.K. will host G7 talks dedicated to climate change this fall in Glasgow.

Links

• The economics of climate change: no action not an option (pdf)
• Revised Estimates of the Impact of Climate Change on Extreme Poverty by 2030 (pdf)
• G7 Economies Could Lose 8.5% Per Year By 2050 Without More Ambitious Climate Action
• Climate crisis to shrink G7 economies twice as much as Covid-19, says research
• Report: World Needs Equivalent Of Pandemic Lockdown Every Two Years To Meet Paris Carbon Emission Goals
• Global Carbon Emissions Bounce Back To Pre-Pandemic Levels
• Report: Drop In Greenhouse Gas Emissions Amid Covid-19 Pandemic Fails To Slow Climate Crisis
• The World Has To Cut Carbon Emissions By 45% Under Paris Agreement, But Is Only On Track For A Less Than 1% Decline