28/06/2016
Make Climate Change Assessments More Relevant
Nature - Stéphane Hallegatte |
Katharine J. Mach
Stéphane Hallegatte, Katharine J. Mach and colleagues urge researchers to gear their studies and the way they present their results to the needs of policymakers.
With the ink just dry on the Paris climate
agreement, policymakers want to know how they can act most effectively.
Ambition is high: the long-term goal is to keep the average warming of
the planet to well below 2 °C, and even to 1.5 °C. Governments,
corporations and communities have many options for minimizing dangerous
climate change, and must choose between conflicting priorities and
objectives. For example, how should governments decarbonize energy while
increasing access to it without resorting to fossil fuels?
No single approach will work for all. The risks and impacts of climate change differ by place and time. Local values and contexts matter. Small islands are vulnerable to sea-level rise, for example, and fossil-fuel exporters will lose profits from the transition to low-carbon energy. We must consider value judgements, such as the relative importance of economic damage versus biodiversity loss, as well as inequality and fairness.
And the relevant climate and social sciences are themselves diverse, from studies of the physics of storm formation to investigations of the role of heritage in cultural identity. The challenge for those who assess such scientific knowledge, such as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), is to summarize results in ways that are true to the original research, explicit about the values and judgements in the analysis, and digestible by and useful to policymakers and the public.
For example, the IPCC's 2014 Synthesis Report encapsulated factors from climate to ecology to technology into a single figure (Figure SPM.10)1. This illustrates how long-term global risks are linked to emissions-reduction requirements under different physical, policy and risk scenarios. Such a figure, although an achievement, can convey only a glimpse of the complex analysis that went into it.
In the IPCC's sixth cycle of assessment, the climate-science community needs to supply the right sorts of information to help decision-makers to construct policies from myriad mitigation and adaptation options. Producing this information will require more multidisciplinary research, updated strategies for communicating uncertainty and studies of a broader range of climate and risk projections that include the impacts of policy responses.
Here, we set out four steps to putting policy relevance at the core of both research and assessment.
Integrate disciplines from the start
The range of risks summarized in the IPCC's 2014 Synthesis Report was limited by the research available. For example, the assessment highlighted increasing risks of climate extremes but said little about how climatic hazards interact with societal vulnerability. Sparse information on how risks evolve at specific warming levels resulted in the reporting of broad, qualitative levels of risk — for example, 'undetectable' to 'very high', as judged by experts. But comparison across risks was difficult.
Climate scientists need to close these gaps by scrutinizing the feedbacks between development pathways, climate change and its impacts and risks, and policies and responses. The community has created socio-economic scenarios that are better able to combine climate-policy consequences and climate-change impacts in certain areas — such as how poverty reduction reduces vulnerability to extreme events — and to investigate their interplay with development trends ranging from population to land-use trajectories2. But covering many climatic and societal futures, globally to locally, is a monumental task. Projects that compare assumptions and results between different models are a start, but need to include more evidence and expert judgements across disciplines.
Research and assessments must be designed to solicit and answer questions crucial to decision-making. For example, how do risks and requirements compare for a climate goal at 1.5 °C, 2 °C or more? How can we avoid locking in to carbon-intensive development pathways and keep open options for rapid decarbonization? How can the effectiveness of adaptation actions be ensured? And how can emissions be reduced without slowing the pace of poverty reduction?
Explore multiple dimensions
Risks from a changing climate and responses to it vary dramatically from place to place, through time and with different levels of adaptation and mitigation. Projections of increases in sea level for different emissions scenarios, for example, range from tens of centimetres to more than 10 metres over centuries to millennia3. Small islands might quickly face inundation whereas large countries would have more time to adapt. Past assessments focused on characterizing a few alternative futures (such as continued high emissions versus ambitious mitigation) rather than weighing up the risks and benefits of limiting warming across a ladder of possible targets: 1.5 °C, 2 °C, 2.5 °C or higher.
A broader census of differences through space and time would strengthen the information foundation for policymaking. Decision-makers with different goals could select portfolios of responses, for example, based on risks to all, risks to the most vulnerable, risks of economic damages, risks of irreversible changes or a combination.
The distribution of losers and winners — regarding policies and impacts as well as people and places — needs to be studied. For example, the destruction of coral reefs affects fishing communities and may add to stresses, especially in places with weak governance. In some high-latitude areas, by contrast, a warming climate will bolster agricultural yields. Building sea walls could reduce coastal flood risks but threaten ecosystems, historical heritage and landscape beauty. Risks and opportunities from investments in mitigation options need to be evaluated. For example, expanding biomass energy may reduce (or reverse) emissions but could also threaten food production and biodiversity. Renewable energy reduces emissions and provides electricity more cheaply than that from fossil fuels in many remote locations, where some of the poorest people live.
More research is needed on regional challenges and opportunities that go beyond the use of a single metric — global mean warming — as a proxy for climate change and its impacts4. For example, ocean acidification and sea-level rise are not linearly related to peak temperature, and the risks that they create require more detailed investigation. And reducing emissions of short-lived climate pollutants such as soot and tropospheric ozone precursors might not change peak warming, but would slow the rate of warming globally5; this would allow more time for ecosystems and societies to adapt, as well as provide local health benefits.
Consider uncertainty
Decision-makers need to appreciate a wide range of possible outcomes, including uncertainty in the consequences of global climate policies. Four aspects of uncertainty must be evaluated and communicated: probability ranges that can be narrowed with future research; unknowns that are linked to a deep lack of knowledge; uncertain reactions that depend on societal decisions and geopolitical events; and other areas of uncertainty that reflect random or chaotic features of the climate system.
The implications of these uncertainty types for policymaking and research need to be untangled. Those that relate to underlying Earth-system processes, such as climate mechanisms that we do and do not understand, or the inherent variability of the climate system, can be addressed through research that increases understanding of climatic hazards. Extreme events and resulting damages lie in the tails of probability distributions that are inherently difficult to quantify or even characterize qualitatively.
Uncertainty need not be a bad thing. Uncertainties related to human choices — such as the multiple pathways to achieve a climate goal — can offer flexibility6. For example, much of the uncertainty in the relationship between emissions in 2050 and eventual temperature rise stems from the possibility of compensating for modest short-term emissions reductions with larger efforts, including negative emissions, in later decades.
An awareness of the diversity of options and their risks is important for making smart policies that allow for regular revisions in light of new information and feedback. More ambitious near-term emissions reductions create more flexibility for responses through the century, depending on whether useful and affordable technologies become available and how climate impacts pan out. Less mitigation early on would constrain options later and compound risks7. Short-term actions — such as the commitments for 2025 or 2030 that countries have made towards the Paris Agreement — can be compatible with a range of long-term targets, depending on the ambition of our efforts later in the century.
Researchers need to assess how different sources of uncertainty affect decision-making, especially in worst-case scenarios. What should we do if temperatures start to rise more rapidly or the impacts are more dangerous than we expect? How can we detect such departures and how should we alter course? Climate policies might prove to be harmful and need revising; technology costs might not fall; carbon capture and sequestration might not work.
Inform holistic solutions
A fuller evaluation of risks and options is needed that includes those created by climate-change responses for other policy goals. For example, the assessment of climate-change risks at 1.5 °C in the IPCC's 2014 Synthesis Report foresaw impacts on coral reefs, Arctic sea ice, water availability, food production and sea-level rise. But the bigger picture should also include issues related to climate mitigation, such as economic duress, land- and water-use trade-offs and calls for high-risk geoengineering methods.
The impacts of climate changes and climate policies will interact if, for instance, a slower reduction in poverty owing to higher energy costs increases vulnerability. Synergies and trade-offs must be evaluated, including risks arising from mitigation actions — not just inactions. Social and climate scientists must investigate the political and socio-economic impacts of climate policies (short- as well as long-term), the distribution of those who benefit and those who are adversely affected, and the influences of powerful interest groups.
It is important to explore how climate responses can advance the Sustainable Development Goals and especially poverty reduction10. For instance, improving access to clean energy and decreasing the economic impacts of extreme weather events can accelerate development progress while protecting poorer nations against climate change. Climate action and protection will never be the sole priorities for decision-makers, but they will be integral to the full policy landscape. Research and assessment can create a powerful foundation for these interactions, and empower decisions in the years ahead.
Footnotes
Stéphane Hallegatte, Katharine J. Mach and colleagues urge researchers to gear their studies and the way they present their results to the needs of policymakers.
 |
| An islander adds to coastal protection at Anse Kerlan beach in the Seychelles. Kadir van Lohuizen / Noor / Eyevine |
No single approach will work for all. The risks and impacts of climate change differ by place and time. Local values and contexts matter. Small islands are vulnerable to sea-level rise, for example, and fossil-fuel exporters will lose profits from the transition to low-carbon energy. We must consider value judgements, such as the relative importance of economic damage versus biodiversity loss, as well as inequality and fairness.
And the relevant climate and social sciences are themselves diverse, from studies of the physics of storm formation to investigations of the role of heritage in cultural identity. The challenge for those who assess such scientific knowledge, such as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), is to summarize results in ways that are true to the original research, explicit about the values and judgements in the analysis, and digestible by and useful to policymakers and the public.
For example, the IPCC's 2014 Synthesis Report encapsulated factors from climate to ecology to technology into a single figure (Figure SPM.10)1. This illustrates how long-term global risks are linked to emissions-reduction requirements under different physical, policy and risk scenarios. Such a figure, although an achievement, can convey only a glimpse of the complex analysis that went into it.
In the IPCC's sixth cycle of assessment, the climate-science community needs to supply the right sorts of information to help decision-makers to construct policies from myriad mitigation and adaptation options. Producing this information will require more multidisciplinary research, updated strategies for communicating uncertainty and studies of a broader range of climate and risk projections that include the impacts of policy responses.
Here, we set out four steps to putting policy relevance at the core of both research and assessment.
Integrate disciplines from the start
The range of risks summarized in the IPCC's 2014 Synthesis Report was limited by the research available. For example, the assessment highlighted increasing risks of climate extremes but said little about how climatic hazards interact with societal vulnerability. Sparse information on how risks evolve at specific warming levels resulted in the reporting of broad, qualitative levels of risk — for example, 'undetectable' to 'very high', as judged by experts. But comparison across risks was difficult.
Climate scientists need to close these gaps by scrutinizing the feedbacks between development pathways, climate change and its impacts and risks, and policies and responses. The community has created socio-economic scenarios that are better able to combine climate-policy consequences and climate-change impacts in certain areas — such as how poverty reduction reduces vulnerability to extreme events — and to investigate their interplay with development trends ranging from population to land-use trajectories2. But covering many climatic and societal futures, globally to locally, is a monumental task. Projects that compare assumptions and results between different models are a start, but need to include more evidence and expert judgements across disciplines.
Research and assessments must be designed to solicit and answer questions crucial to decision-making. For example, how do risks and requirements compare for a climate goal at 1.5 °C, 2 °C or more? How can we avoid locking in to carbon-intensive development pathways and keep open options for rapid decarbonization? How can the effectiveness of adaptation actions be ensured? And how can emissions be reduced without slowing the pace of poverty reduction?
 |
| Sugarcane production is rising in Brazil to meet demand for ethanol for biofuel. Adriano Machado / Bloomberg / Getty |
Risks from a changing climate and responses to it vary dramatically from place to place, through time and with different levels of adaptation and mitigation. Projections of increases in sea level for different emissions scenarios, for example, range from tens of centimetres to more than 10 metres over centuries to millennia3. Small islands might quickly face inundation whereas large countries would have more time to adapt. Past assessments focused on characterizing a few alternative futures (such as continued high emissions versus ambitious mitigation) rather than weighing up the risks and benefits of limiting warming across a ladder of possible targets: 1.5 °C, 2 °C, 2.5 °C or higher.
A broader census of differences through space and time would strengthen the information foundation for policymaking. Decision-makers with different goals could select portfolios of responses, for example, based on risks to all, risks to the most vulnerable, risks of economic damages, risks of irreversible changes or a combination.
The distribution of losers and winners — regarding policies and impacts as well as people and places — needs to be studied. For example, the destruction of coral reefs affects fishing communities and may add to stresses, especially in places with weak governance. In some high-latitude areas, by contrast, a warming climate will bolster agricultural yields. Building sea walls could reduce coastal flood risks but threaten ecosystems, historical heritage and landscape beauty. Risks and opportunities from investments in mitigation options need to be evaluated. For example, expanding biomass energy may reduce (or reverse) emissions but could also threaten food production and biodiversity. Renewable energy reduces emissions and provides electricity more cheaply than that from fossil fuels in many remote locations, where some of the poorest people live.
More research is needed on regional challenges and opportunities that go beyond the use of a single metric — global mean warming — as a proxy for climate change and its impacts4. For example, ocean acidification and sea-level rise are not linearly related to peak temperature, and the risks that they create require more detailed investigation. And reducing emissions of short-lived climate pollutants such as soot and tropospheric ozone precursors might not change peak warming, but would slow the rate of warming globally5; this would allow more time for ecosystems and societies to adapt, as well as provide local health benefits.
Consider uncertainty
Decision-makers need to appreciate a wide range of possible outcomes, including uncertainty in the consequences of global climate policies. Four aspects of uncertainty must be evaluated and communicated: probability ranges that can be narrowed with future research; unknowns that are linked to a deep lack of knowledge; uncertain reactions that depend on societal decisions and geopolitical events; and other areas of uncertainty that reflect random or chaotic features of the climate system.
The implications of these uncertainty types for policymaking and research need to be untangled. Those that relate to underlying Earth-system processes, such as climate mechanisms that we do and do not understand, or the inherent variability of the climate system, can be addressed through research that increases understanding of climatic hazards. Extreme events and resulting damages lie in the tails of probability distributions that are inherently difficult to quantify or even characterize qualitatively.
Uncertainty need not be a bad thing. Uncertainties related to human choices — such as the multiple pathways to achieve a climate goal — can offer flexibility6. For example, much of the uncertainty in the relationship between emissions in 2050 and eventual temperature rise stems from the possibility of compensating for modest short-term emissions reductions with larger efforts, including negative emissions, in later decades.
An awareness of the diversity of options and their risks is important for making smart policies that allow for regular revisions in light of new information and feedback. More ambitious near-term emissions reductions create more flexibility for responses through the century, depending on whether useful and affordable technologies become available and how climate impacts pan out. Less mitigation early on would constrain options later and compound risks7. Short-term actions — such as the commitments for 2025 or 2030 that countries have made towards the Paris Agreement — can be compatible with a range of long-term targets, depending on the ambition of our efforts later in the century.
"Synergies and trade-offs must be evaluated, including risks arising from mitigation actions — not just inactions."Assessing whether current policies are consistent with long-term goals depends on many factors that are impossible to predict with confidence8, 9. And not knowing how people will respond makes such an assessment even harder. So emissions pathways that seem compatible today with a long-term temperature target could lead us to higher — or lower — levels of warming, depending on everything from future global climate policies to technology costs to the climate sensitivity of the Earth system. Intensified focus on limiting global warming to 2 °C or 1.5 °C decreases the risk of greater warming in the long term, for example a rise exceeding 3 °C, should available technologies turn out to be limited or climate sensitivity higher than expected.
Researchers need to assess how different sources of uncertainty affect decision-making, especially in worst-case scenarios. What should we do if temperatures start to rise more rapidly or the impacts are more dangerous than we expect? How can we detect such departures and how should we alter course? Climate policies might prove to be harmful and need revising; technology costs might not fall; carbon capture and sequestration might not work.
Inform holistic solutions
A fuller evaluation of risks and options is needed that includes those created by climate-change responses for other policy goals. For example, the assessment of climate-change risks at 1.5 °C in the IPCC's 2014 Synthesis Report foresaw impacts on coral reefs, Arctic sea ice, water availability, food production and sea-level rise. But the bigger picture should also include issues related to climate mitigation, such as economic duress, land- and water-use trade-offs and calls for high-risk geoengineering methods.
The impacts of climate changes and climate policies will interact if, for instance, a slower reduction in poverty owing to higher energy costs increases vulnerability. Synergies and trade-offs must be evaluated, including risks arising from mitigation actions — not just inactions. Social and climate scientists must investigate the political and socio-economic impacts of climate policies (short- as well as long-term), the distribution of those who benefit and those who are adversely affected, and the influences of powerful interest groups.
It is important to explore how climate responses can advance the Sustainable Development Goals and especially poverty reduction10. For instance, improving access to clean energy and decreasing the economic impacts of extreme weather events can accelerate development progress while protecting poorer nations against climate change. Climate action and protection will never be the sole priorities for decision-makers, but they will be integral to the full policy landscape. Research and assessment can create a powerful foundation for these interactions, and empower decisions in the years ahead.
Footnotes
- et al. Climate Change 2014: Synthesis Report. Contribution of Working Groups I, II and III to the Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC, 2014).
- O'Neill, B. C. et al. Clim. Change 122, 387–400 (2014).
- et al. Nature Clim. Change 6, 360–369 (2016).
- , & Nature 499, 197–201 (2013).
- et al. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 111, 16325–16330 (2014).
- , , & Nature Clim. Change 5, 917–920 (2015).
- et al. (eds.) Climate Change 2014: Mitigation of Climate Change. Contribution of Working Group III to the Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (Cambridge Univ. Press, 2014).
- et al. Technol. Forecast. Soc. Change 90, 1–7 (2015).
- & Clim. Change 104, 793–801 (2010).
- et al. Shock Waves: Managing the Impacts of Climate Change on Poverty (World Bank, 2016).
- Economics: Current climate models are grossly misleading
- Emissions reduction: Scrutinize CO2 removal methods
- Policy: Development goals should enable decision-making
- Economics: Current climate models are grossly misleading
- Emissions reduction: Scrutinize CO2 removal methods
- Policy: Development goals should enable decision-making
- Policy: Climate advisers must maintain integrity
- Climate change: Embed the social sciences in climate policy
Australia Faces Its Own Brexit Experience
Independent Australia - Peter Boyer
As in Britain, Australians are dissatisfied with the establishment but we mustn't opt out. Despite the Coalition's claims to the contrary, our emissions are rising and we need to vote for climate change action, urges Peter Boyer.
THE PARIS climate summit (COP21)
last year was a ray of sunshine for global climate policy, getting
nations to commit to tightening targets and an aspirational 1.5C warming
limit.
Credit for that success must go to the host nation, France, to the community of nations that supported it to the hilt, the European Union (EU), and to the (once) United Kingdom.
Many Australian conservative politicians would have been perplexed at Britain's leadership of Europe's "Green Growth Group" of nations and its push – against strong objections from some EU members – for much stronger low-carbon policies in Europe.
On the basis of scientific advice that 2C of warming would bring yet more extreme, highly destructive weather, the UK under David Cameron, led the argument for European policies to target the much safer limit of 1.5C of warming.
This was Britain at its best, working within a complex, unwieldy system to achieve advances weighty enough to shape world politics. Last week, less uplifting British qualities were on show.
Brexit was a victory for age over youth, which has most to lose from climate change. Where their elders saw danger in open borders and opted to put up the shutters, Britons aged from 18 to 24 saw opportunity in an open Europe and voted three to one against leaving.
The new Little Britain looks like it might have to do without its Scottish and Irish electorate, which voted overwhelmingly to stay in Europe. Disgruntled Scotland has now renewed its campaign to leave the UK and a reunion of Ulster with republican Ireland is firmly on the table.
How Brexit will affect the global effort to mitigate climate change will take years to play out but it's a near-certainty that Europe will now stick with its 40 per cent 2030 target (against Australia's 26 to 28 per cent) instead of the 50 per cent that the UK was pushing.
Any sustained economic slump arising from Brexit will help bring emissions down. But more significantly, it will also diminish resources to develop clean energy, helped along by the fact that nationalist sentiment has more than a little in common with climate-change denial.
Britain's new leader may be Cameron's chief Brexit opponent, Boris Johnson, who once voiced scepticism about human-induced warming on the basis of a string of snowy British winters. That same shallow, ill-considered thinking surfaced repeatedly during the campaign.
I almost forgot – we have our own poll coming up. It too involves pent-up frustration with political and financial authority in an increasingly unequal Australia. Major parties are on the nose, as in Britain, and it's likely that what divides us now will still divide us afterwards.
Climate policy is one of those divides, revealed in an admirably independent and thorough analysis of parties' pre-election climate policies by Australia's Climate Institute.
All were found wanting. The Greens and (surprisingly) the Glenn Lazarus Team (GLT) came out best, but Green inflexibility and the GLT's lack of detail were negatives. The Nick Xenophon Team scored well on ambition but also lacked detail.
The Climate Institute assessment didn't include recent arrivals like the Renewable Energy Party or independents like Denison MP Andrew Wilkie. Both, I think, would have scored highly.
Applied globally, says the Climate Institute, Labor's policies still wouldn't keep warming below the dangerous 2C threshold, while the Coalition's would leave us a disastrous 3C to 4C warmer.
Former Liberal leader John Hewson is having none of it. He absented himself from Malcolm Turnbull's campaign launch on Sunday, to tell a rally in Turnbull's Sydney electorate that the need for bipartisan leadership on climate is "more than urgent".
Many electors, seeing Australian emissions still rising while hearing false claims to the contrary, share Hewson's concern. While time ticks away our political masters choose to talk of other things.
But however frustrated you are with the established order, don't opt out. Our main game has to be a decarbonised economy. On Saturday vote for those who will work for it and avoid those who won't.
Links
Climate change takes its first proven victim at Bramble Cay
Move to sack leading CSIRO scientist shocks scientific world
Acidifying oceans highlight Australia's barren climate policy
Greg Hunt's cultivated optimism gets us nowhere
Australia's climate effort falling behind in 'critical decade'
Ice melt studies say we underestimate sea level rise
The crazy saga of the great CSIRO sell-off
Earth is running a fever - not that the CSIRO will be reporting on it now
Using trees for carbon accounts looks good but it's a con
As in Britain, Australians are dissatisfied with the establishment but we mustn't opt out. Despite the Coalition's claims to the contrary, our emissions are rising and we need to vote for climate change action, urges Peter Boyer.
 |
| (Image via businessreviewaustralia.com) |
Credit for that success must go to the host nation, France, to the community of nations that supported it to the hilt, the European Union (EU), and to the (once) United Kingdom.
Many Australian conservative politicians would have been perplexed at Britain's leadership of Europe's "Green Growth Group" of nations and its push – against strong objections from some EU members – for much stronger low-carbon policies in Europe.
On the basis of scientific advice that 2C of warming would bring yet more extreme, highly destructive weather, the UK under David Cameron, led the argument for European policies to target the much safer limit of 1.5C of warming.
This was Britain at its best, working within a complex, unwieldy system to achieve advances weighty enough to shape world politics. Last week, less uplifting British qualities were on show.
Brexit was a victory for age over youth, which has most to lose from climate change. Where their elders saw danger in open borders and opted to put up the shutters, Britons aged from 18 to 24 saw opportunity in an open Europe and voted three to one against leaving.
The new Little Britain looks like it might have to do without its Scottish and Irish electorate, which voted overwhelmingly to stay in Europe. Disgruntled Scotland has now renewed its campaign to leave the UK and a reunion of Ulster with republican Ireland is firmly on the table.
How Brexit will affect the global effort to mitigate climate change will take years to play out but it's a near-certainty that Europe will now stick with its 40 per cent 2030 target (against Australia's 26 to 28 per cent) instead of the 50 per cent that the UK was pushing.
Any sustained economic slump arising from Brexit will help bring emissions down. But more significantly, it will also diminish resources to develop clean energy, helped along by the fact that nationalist sentiment has more than a little in common with climate-change denial.
Britain's new leader may be Cameron's chief Brexit opponent, Boris Johnson, who once voiced scepticism about human-induced warming on the basis of a string of snowy British winters. That same shallow, ill-considered thinking surfaced repeatedly during the campaign.
I almost forgot – we have our own poll coming up. It too involves pent-up frustration with political and financial authority in an increasingly unequal Australia. Major parties are on the nose, as in Britain, and it's likely that what divides us now will still divide us afterwards.
Climate policy is one of those divides, revealed in an admirably independent and thorough analysis of parties' pre-election climate policies by Australia's Climate Institute.
All were found wanting. The Greens and (surprisingly) the Glenn Lazarus Team (GLT) came out best, but Green inflexibility and the GLT's lack of detail were negatives. The Nick Xenophon Team scored well on ambition but also lacked detail.
The Climate Institute assessment didn't include recent arrivals like the Renewable Energy Party or independents like Denison MP Andrew Wilkie. Both, I think, would have scored highly.
Applied globally, says the Climate Institute, Labor's policies still wouldn't keep warming below the dangerous 2C threshold, while the Coalition's would leave us a disastrous 3C to 4C warmer.
Former Liberal leader John Hewson is having none of it. He absented himself from Malcolm Turnbull's campaign launch on Sunday, to tell a rally in Turnbull's Sydney electorate that the need for bipartisan leadership on climate is "more than urgent".
Many electors, seeing Australian emissions still rising while hearing false claims to the contrary, share Hewson's concern. While time ticks away our political masters choose to talk of other things.
But however frustrated you are with the established order, don't opt out. Our main game has to be a decarbonised economy. On Saturday vote for those who will work for it and avoid those who won't.
Links
27/06/2016
Climate Change: John Hewson Accuses Coalition Of 'National Disgrace'
The Guardian - Michael Slezak
Former Liberal leader says climate should be dominant issue of election campaign rather than ‘short-term politicking’
The former Liberal leader John Hewson addressed an estimated 2000
people protesting in the Sydney suburb of Double Bay – minutes from
Malcolm Turnbull’s harbourside mansion – calling on the prime minister
to take stronger action on climate change.
Speaking at the same time as Turnbull addressed the party faithful at the Coalition’s campaign launch, Hewson told protesters the Coalition’s lack of action on climate change was a “national disgrace”.
“I think climate change should be the dominant issue of this campaign – it should have been for quite some time,” said Hewson, who was once the local member for the seat of Wentworth, which includes Double Bay.
He said “short-term politicking” from both sides left targets that were inadequate and policies that were not going to meet those targets.
“The one thing that hasn’t failed is people like yourselves,” he said. “The community is way ahead of the political leaders and the business leaders on this issue.”
He urged the crowd to push political leaders for a bipartisan approach to climate change. “Enough is enough, it’s time to act,” Hewson said.
A spokesperson from GetUp, which organised the protest in coalition with three other environment groups, estimated there were about 2000 people in the crowd.
Protesters were given placards in the shape of coral, which were coloured on one side, and white on the other, which symbolised the devastating bleaching on the Great Barrier Reef. They turned them around for the cameras, while chanting “Choose the reef, not coal”.
Robert Shelly, who lives in Vaucluse, attended the protest with his
two-year-old daughter, Ariella, and her dog. “We come from a family with
a big environmental conscience. It’s a very important issue and it’s
been completely ignored by the mainstream,” he said.
Paula Brook, who lives in Woollahra, said she was motivated to come to the protest after seeing the Australian Conservation Foundation’s scorecard, which said the Coalition’s environmental policies were “woefully inadequate”.
“The Coalition was really far down, and this is Malcolm Turnbull’s electorate and so it was important to show him that people care about environmental issues,” she said.
The crowd was also addressed by Dr Kate Charlesworth, who was until
recently a Wentworth resident and previously worked at the sustainable
development unit at the National Health Service in the UK. She said
although climate change was a great risk to human health, and a health
emergency, actions that would mitigate climate change had the potential
to be a great boost to human health.
“Things like active transport – walking and cycling – improved diets with more plant based foods; looking at the causes of air pollution; reducing traffic congestion; healthier cities with more green space and tree cover. All these things will have tremendous benefits to human health,” she said.
Michael Borgas, a climate scientist at the CSIRO also addressed the crowd, calling on the government to fund climate science, following the news that the CSIRO was making significant cuts to its climate research.
Tony Fontes, a Great Barrier Reef
diving instructor, also spoke, calling for stronger climate action to
protect the reef. “We’ve just seen the greatest, most devastating
bleaching event in the history of the reef and we’re going to see more.”
Lyndon Schneiders, the national director for the Wilderness Society, which helped organise the protest, said: “Malcolm Turnbull must do more to address climate change. The Great Barrier Reef is dying on Mr Turnbull’s watch and yet his government sticks to its inadequate Direct Action policy.”
Nikola Casule from Greenpeace – another organiser of the protest – said Australia’s greenhouse gas emissions were growing and forecast to increase until 2030. “The science is clear – the world needs to stop emitting greenhouse gases but our emissions are going in the other direction.”
The protest caps three days of protesting in Turnbull’s electorate.
On Friday Greenpeace activists hung a banner from Turnbull’s electorate office in Edgecliff, saying: “Turnbull’s Legacy: bleaching – brought to you by Malcolm’s mates in the coal industry.”
And on Saturday, a group of 50 pacific islanders kayaked from Blues Point to Lady Martin’s beach, mere metres from Turnbull’s harbourside mansion, raising awareness of climate change and sea level rise.
Links
Former Liberal leader says climate should be dominant issue of election campaign rather than ‘short-term politicking’
 |
| The former Liberal leader and Wentworth MP John Hewson says the wider community is ‘way ahead’ of political and business leaders on climate change. Photograph: Michael Slezak for the Guardian |
Speaking at the same time as Turnbull addressed the party faithful at the Coalition’s campaign launch, Hewson told protesters the Coalition’s lack of action on climate change was a “national disgrace”.
“I think climate change should be the dominant issue of this campaign – it should have been for quite some time,” said Hewson, who was once the local member for the seat of Wentworth, which includes Double Bay.
He said “short-term politicking” from both sides left targets that were inadequate and policies that were not going to meet those targets.
“The one thing that hasn’t failed is people like yourselves,” he said. “The community is way ahead of the political leaders and the business leaders on this issue.”
He urged the crowd to push political leaders for a bipartisan approach to climate change. “Enough is enough, it’s time to act,” Hewson said.
A spokesperson from GetUp, which organised the protest in coalition with three other environment groups, estimated there were about 2000 people in the crowd.
Protesters were given placards in the shape of coral, which were coloured on one side, and white on the other, which symbolised the devastating bleaching on the Great Barrier Reef. They turned them around for the cameras, while chanting “Choose the reef, not coal”.
 |
| Protestors in fancy dress at the #climatefizza rally. Photograph: Michael Slezak for the Guardian |
Paula Brook, who lives in Woollahra, said she was motivated to come to the protest after seeing the Australian Conservation Foundation’s scorecard, which said the Coalition’s environmental policies were “woefully inadequate”.
“The Coalition was really far down, and this is Malcolm Turnbull’s electorate and so it was important to show him that people care about environmental issues,” she said.
 |
| A sizeable crowd in Malcolm Turnbull's electorate calling for stronger action on climate change. Photograph: Michael Slezak for the Guardian |
“Things like active transport – walking and cycling – improved diets with more plant based foods; looking at the causes of air pollution; reducing traffic congestion; healthier cities with more green space and tree cover. All these things will have tremendous benefits to human health,” she said.
Michael Borgas, a climate scientist at the CSIRO also addressed the crowd, calling on the government to fund climate science, following the news that the CSIRO was making significant cuts to its climate research.
 |
| Message to Malcolm Turnbull at rally in Wentworth. Photograph: Michael Slezak for the Guardian |
Lyndon Schneiders, the national director for the Wilderness Society, which helped organise the protest, said: “Malcolm Turnbull must do more to address climate change. The Great Barrier Reef is dying on Mr Turnbull’s watch and yet his government sticks to its inadequate Direct Action policy.”
Nikola Casule from Greenpeace – another organiser of the protest – said Australia’s greenhouse gas emissions were growing and forecast to increase until 2030. “The science is clear – the world needs to stop emitting greenhouse gases but our emissions are going in the other direction.”
 |
| Protesters turn their coral around to symbolize its bleaching. Photograph: Michael Slezak for the Guardian |
On Friday Greenpeace activists hung a banner from Turnbull’s electorate office in Edgecliff, saying: “Turnbull’s Legacy: bleaching – brought to you by Malcolm’s mates in the coal industry.”
And on Saturday, a group of 50 pacific islanders kayaked from Blues Point to Lady Martin’s beach, mere metres from Turnbull’s harbourside mansion, raising awareness of climate change and sea level rise.
Links
- Business and academic leaders urge new conversation about coal-free future
- How the Coalition is using clean energy financing as an election slush fund
- Climate change: Australia's big banks urged to reject new loans for coal projects
- Saving Great Barrier Reef from climate change should be central election issue, says Tim Flannery
- Labor proposes two emissions trading schemes costing $355.9m
Coalition's 'War On Solar' Has Sector Cutting Back, Industry Groups Say
Fairfax - Peter Hannam
Australia's solar energy sector is facing further job losses amid falling numbers of new rooftop installations amid a lack of support during the Abbott-Turnbull governments, industry representatives say.
New investment in household and small businesses installing systems with less than 100-kilowatt capacity has dropped to a seven-year low, with Coalition policies largely to blame, John Grimes, chief executive of the Australian Solar Council, said.
"The sunburnt country has burnt its solar industry," Mr Grimes
said. "Thousands of jobs have been lost and hundreds of small businesses
have closed their doors."
Mr Grimes cited a range of policies during the past three years, such as the failed bids by the Abbott government to eliminate the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA), and the broken promise to support 1 million additional solar-powered homes, that amounted to a "ideological war on solar".
Even after September's change in prime minister to Malcolm Turnbull, the Coalition still had no solar target, no target for renewable energy beyond 2020, and had "not provided one supportive policy" for the industry, Mr Grimes said.
(See chart below of new installations according to the Clean Energy Regulator, including figures for the first four months of 2016.)
Darren Gladman, solar policy manager at the Clean Energy
Council, attributed the drop of solar installations in part to
the winding back of generous state schemes.
He noted, though, that unease among investors over the Abbott government's handling of the review of the 2020 Renewable Energy Target had also dented demand for small-scale solar.
While solar panel penetration had reached saturation point in some parts of the country, Labor and the Greens were both offering policies worth about $100 million to open up new areas of demand such as among renters and low-income houses, Mr Gladman said.
"If you're not able to access solar, you're paying more for electricity than you otherwise could," he said.
According to the Clean Energy Council's Annual Report, the drop in installations has occurred in most states and territories since the peak year of 2011. (See chart below.)
Kobad Bhavnagri, head of Bloomberg New Energy Finance in
Australia, said "the government has basically not touched the rooftop
sector".
While ditching the pre-2013 election pledge of 1 million additional solar homes amounted to a broken promise by the Coalition, "it was pretty rational to not introduce further subsidies to a well-supported sector which is already economical", Mr Bhavnagri said.
Under the existing renewable energy target, households get a reduction in the up-front capital costs of a new system of about 30 per cent.
According to Bloomberg NEF data, last year a typical household could expect savings on their electricity bills to pay off the cost of their systems in six years. By 2030, further advances in technology should lower that to five years.
The cost of batteries, which have the potential to bolster solar panels' appeal, now have a payoff period of about 19 years but that should drop to eight years by 2030, Bloomberg predicts.
(See Bloomberg chart below showing solar module costs in US dollars diving 80 per cent since 2008.)
While the residential market is struggling, the industry is
increasingly turning to commercial customers, Mr Gladwell said. These
now account for about 30 per cent of sales by capacity.
The industry is also looking to large-scale solar farms as a growth area as uncertainty over the 2020 Renewable Energy Target recedes. Earlier this month, the NSW government gave planning approval for four new plants that would double the state's existing solar farm capacity.
Links
Australia's solar energy sector is facing further job losses amid falling numbers of new rooftop installations amid a lack of support during the Abbott-Turnbull governments, industry representatives say.
New investment in household and small businesses installing systems with less than 100-kilowatt capacity has dropped to a seven-year low, with Coalition policies largely to blame, John Grimes, chief executive of the Australian Solar Council, said.
 |
| Setting sun on solar?: Industry highlights drop in new installations. Photo: Justin McManus |
Mr Grimes cited a range of policies during the past three years, such as the failed bids by the Abbott government to eliminate the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA), and the broken promise to support 1 million additional solar-powered homes, that amounted to a "ideological war on solar".
Even after September's change in prime minister to Malcolm Turnbull, the Coalition still had no solar target, no target for renewable energy beyond 2020, and had "not provided one supportive policy" for the industry, Mr Grimes said.
(See chart below of new installations according to the Clean Energy Regulator, including figures for the first four months of 2016.)
Darren Gladman, solar policy manager at the Clean Energy
Council, attributed the drop of solar installations in part to
the winding back of generous state schemes.He noted, though, that unease among investors over the Abbott government's handling of the review of the 2020 Renewable Energy Target had also dented demand for small-scale solar.
While solar panel penetration had reached saturation point in some parts of the country, Labor and the Greens were both offering policies worth about $100 million to open up new areas of demand such as among renters and low-income houses, Mr Gladman said.
"If you're not able to access solar, you're paying more for electricity than you otherwise could," he said.
According to the Clean Energy Council's Annual Report, the drop in installations has occurred in most states and territories since the peak year of 2011. (See chart below.)
Kobad Bhavnagri, head of Bloomberg New Energy Finance in
Australia, said "the government has basically not touched the rooftop
sector". While ditching the pre-2013 election pledge of 1 million additional solar homes amounted to a broken promise by the Coalition, "it was pretty rational to not introduce further subsidies to a well-supported sector which is already economical", Mr Bhavnagri said.
Under the existing renewable energy target, households get a reduction in the up-front capital costs of a new system of about 30 per cent.
According to Bloomberg NEF data, last year a typical household could expect savings on their electricity bills to pay off the cost of their systems in six years. By 2030, further advances in technology should lower that to five years.
The cost of batteries, which have the potential to bolster solar panels' appeal, now have a payoff period of about 19 years but that should drop to eight years by 2030, Bloomberg predicts.
(See Bloomberg chart below showing solar module costs in US dollars diving 80 per cent since 2008.)
While the residential market is struggling, the industry is
increasingly turning to commercial customers, Mr Gladwell said. These
now account for about 30 per cent of sales by capacity.The industry is also looking to large-scale solar farms as a growth area as uncertainty over the 2020 Renewable Energy Target recedes. Earlier this month, the NSW government gave planning approval for four new plants that would double the state's existing solar farm capacity.
Links
This Chart Perfectly Explains What’s At Stake In The Quest To Stop Climate Change
Washington Post - Chris Mooney
Here
at the Energy and Environment blog, we cover, regularly, the tipping
points of climate change — how, for instance, the glaciers of West
Antarctica may already have passed a key threshold that leads to unstoppable melt.
We cover the history of the Earth's climate — including why the Holocene era, which began some 11,700 years ago and we lived in up until fairly recently (when many researchers believe an "Anthropocene" began), was so stable and conducive to human civilization.
And of course we cover the quest to keep warming below the Paris climate targets, 1.5 degrees and 2 degrees Celsius, and the scenarios for greenhouse gas emissions that might be capable of doing that — and also those that can't.
But these are all complicated, nuanced stories, and the idea that they can all be pulled together into one analysis — much less one figure — is hard to believe.
Nonetheless, I think three researchers from the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research have done precisely that with the image below, which is part of an optimistic essay they just published in Nature Climate Change, suggesting that the recently negotiated Paris climate agreement has what it takes to stabilize climate change. In the process, the researchers deliver the sort of rare big picture analysis that we mortals need now and again to understand why scientists are generally so freaked about a warming climate, and also why, in this case, they're feeling a shard of hope.
Here's the image, with unpacking to follow:
"Earth
system science has come of age and can provide robust evidence for the
intuitive assumption that it is not a good idea to leave the 'safe
operating space' of humanity, and that this space is well within the
Paris confines," Hans Joachim Schellnhuber, Stefan Rahmstorf and Ricarda
Winkelmann of the Potsdam Institute write in the study that contains
the image.
"The sustenance of Holocene climate conditions under
which Homo sapiens thrived while the Neolithic Revolution established
human civilization was an early key argument in favour of the 2 °C
guardrail," they further note. Both quotations summarize the key point
of the image: The Paris agreement, if implemented successfully with its
targets respected — and especially the lower boundary, 1.5 degrees C —
gives hope of keeping us from exceeding tipping points that would erase the key climatic parameters that sustained our very development.
That's a pretty big deal.
To show this, the graphic blends together four key elements — where current temperatures are in the context of the last 22,000 years, including the stable period that fostered modern humanity; where the Paris climate agreement aspires to hold temperatures and how that fits into this context; how high temperatures could rise under various greenhouse gas emissions scenarios; and which major parts of the climate system could be "tipped" at different temperature ranges.
"This graphic is really based basically on the advances made by the entire climate research community over I would say the last two decades," Winkelmann said in an interview. It "sort of summarizes what we know right now about tipping elements, and how the risk increases with increasing global warming to tip one of these major, major parts of the climate system. And you can really see the tipping elements as the major Achilles heel of the climate system."
The authors' argument is not, of course, that we'll be perfectly safe if the Paris agreement is successfully implemented. We're already seeing devastating losses to coral reefs — which, the image suggests, are the single most vulnerable element in the entire system — a plunge in Arctic sea ice, and, many scientists think, a tipping point for West Antarctica.
These are among the most sensitive elements of the Earth's climate system, and as the figure shows, we start fiddling with them even before we enter the Paris temperature range between 1.5 and 2 degrees C.
Nonetheless, if we exceed the Paris boundaries, we appear increasingly likely to commit to irreversible changes in these areas. "Beyond 2 °C the course would be set for a complete deglaciation of the Northern Hemisphere, threatening the survival of many coastal cities and island nations," they write.
And blundering further, we could subject ourselves to many other risks. Those include, in the figure above, shutting down the ocean's "thermohaline" or overturning circulation (THC), changing the El Nino-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) in favor of more dominant El Nino conditions, and also tipping the gigantic ice mass of East Antarctica (EAIS). (For a full description of these tipping points or "elements," see here.)
"There are some that could possibly already be switched within the Paris range, and then there's another cluster of tipping elements, where we have the chance to avoid tipping those for even higher temperatures," Winkelmann said. She notes that many of the tipping elements involve a feedback process: Greenland's ice sheet, for instance, will lose elevation as it melts, subjecting it to warmer temperatures in the lower atmosphere, which will cause more melt. And so on.
Granted, in any given case, some scientists might fear or suspect that some of these tipping points are closer to us than the diagram above suggests. The Amazon, the boreal or northern forest, the Atlantic ocean's circulation, northern permafrost and East Antarctica are already showing signs of changes. But the researchers think these systems might nonetheless be more resilient.
Energy and Environment newsletter The science and policy of environmental issues. They go on to argue a more difficult point — that we just might see an "exponential" growth of wind and solar that is sufficient to, in turn, trigger an "implosion" of the fossil fuel industry and thus help keep within the Paris targets. Something at least this dynamic would be needed to get the world to stop emitting fast enough to stay within the temperature "guardrail" above, without relying on pie-in-the-sky technological fixes like so-called negative carbon emissions.
The truth is that renewables are growing very rapidly right now, but from a low level of penetration, and the precise technological evolution of our energy system remains unclear.
Still, nobody can claim that scientists haven't made clear what's at stake.
"One could basically say that what we're doing today with greenhouse gas emissions — which is just basically in a moment when you look at the geophysical timescales — that has consequences for decades, centuries, millennia," Winkelmann said.
Links
 |
| This image provided by NASA shows Arctic sea ice at it maximum, the lowest on record. The winter maximum level of Arctic sea ice shrank to the smallest on record, thanks to extraordinarily warm temperatures, federal scientists said. The National Snow and Ice Data Center says sea ice spread to a maximum of 5.607 million square miles in 2016. That's 5,000 square miles less than the old record set in 2015, a difference slightly smaller than the state of Connecticut. (NASA via AP) |
We cover the history of the Earth's climate — including why the Holocene era, which began some 11,700 years ago and we lived in up until fairly recently (when many researchers believe an "Anthropocene" began), was so stable and conducive to human civilization.
And of course we cover the quest to keep warming below the Paris climate targets, 1.5 degrees and 2 degrees Celsius, and the scenarios for greenhouse gas emissions that might be capable of doing that — and also those that can't.
But these are all complicated, nuanced stories, and the idea that they can all be pulled together into one analysis — much less one figure — is hard to believe.
Nonetheless, I think three researchers from the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research have done precisely that with the image below, which is part of an optimistic essay they just published in Nature Climate Change, suggesting that the recently negotiated Paris climate agreement has what it takes to stabilize climate change. In the process, the researchers deliver the sort of rare big picture analysis that we mortals need now and again to understand why scientists are generally so freaked about a warming climate, and also why, in this case, they're feeling a shard of hope.
Here's the image, with unpacking to follow:
 |
| Schellnhuber et al., Nature Climate Change. The figure shows, according to the authors, the "global mean surface temperature evolution from the Last Glacial maximum through the Holocene," combined with the temperature range aspired to in the Paris climate agreement, possible temperature rises for different greenhouse gas emissions scenarios (RCP2.6, RCP8.5, and so on), and the tipping point thresholds for various major planetary changes. |
That's a pretty big deal.
To show this, the graphic blends together four key elements — where current temperatures are in the context of the last 22,000 years, including the stable period that fostered modern humanity; where the Paris climate agreement aspires to hold temperatures and how that fits into this context; how high temperatures could rise under various greenhouse gas emissions scenarios; and which major parts of the climate system could be "tipped" at different temperature ranges.
"This graphic is really based basically on the advances made by the entire climate research community over I would say the last two decades," Winkelmann said in an interview. It "sort of summarizes what we know right now about tipping elements, and how the risk increases with increasing global warming to tip one of these major, major parts of the climate system. And you can really see the tipping elements as the major Achilles heel of the climate system."
The authors' argument is not, of course, that we'll be perfectly safe if the Paris agreement is successfully implemented. We're already seeing devastating losses to coral reefs — which, the image suggests, are the single most vulnerable element in the entire system — a plunge in Arctic sea ice, and, many scientists think, a tipping point for West Antarctica.
These are among the most sensitive elements of the Earth's climate system, and as the figure shows, we start fiddling with them even before we enter the Paris temperature range between 1.5 and 2 degrees C.
Nonetheless, if we exceed the Paris boundaries, we appear increasingly likely to commit to irreversible changes in these areas. "Beyond 2 °C the course would be set for a complete deglaciation of the Northern Hemisphere, threatening the survival of many coastal cities and island nations," they write.
And blundering further, we could subject ourselves to many other risks. Those include, in the figure above, shutting down the ocean's "thermohaline" or overturning circulation (THC), changing the El Nino-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) in favor of more dominant El Nino conditions, and also tipping the gigantic ice mass of East Antarctica (EAIS). (For a full description of these tipping points or "elements," see here.)
"There are some that could possibly already be switched within the Paris range, and then there's another cluster of tipping elements, where we have the chance to avoid tipping those for even higher temperatures," Winkelmann said. She notes that many of the tipping elements involve a feedback process: Greenland's ice sheet, for instance, will lose elevation as it melts, subjecting it to warmer temperatures in the lower atmosphere, which will cause more melt. And so on.
Granted, in any given case, some scientists might fear or suspect that some of these tipping points are closer to us than the diagram above suggests. The Amazon, the boreal or northern forest, the Atlantic ocean's circulation, northern permafrost and East Antarctica are already showing signs of changes. But the researchers think these systems might nonetheless be more resilient.
Energy and Environment newsletter The science and policy of environmental issues. They go on to argue a more difficult point — that we just might see an "exponential" growth of wind and solar that is sufficient to, in turn, trigger an "implosion" of the fossil fuel industry and thus help keep within the Paris targets. Something at least this dynamic would be needed to get the world to stop emitting fast enough to stay within the temperature "guardrail" above, without relying on pie-in-the-sky technological fixes like so-called negative carbon emissions.
The truth is that renewables are growing very rapidly right now, but from a low level of penetration, and the precise technological evolution of our energy system remains unclear.
Still, nobody can claim that scientists haven't made clear what's at stake.
"One could basically say that what we're doing today with greenhouse gas emissions — which is just basically in a moment when you look at the geophysical timescales — that has consequences for decades, centuries, millennia," Winkelmann said.
Links
- The math the planet relies on isn't adding up right now
- As Greenland melts, one of its most famous glaciers is creating terrifying tsunamis
- Virgin Atlantic just used behavioral science to 'nudge' its pilots into using less fuel. It worked
- Obama's advisers just dismantled a key myth about the future of clean energy
26/06/2016
Scientists Call On Australia To Save World’s Reefs
The Marshalltown - Helen Clark
As the largest international gathering of coral reef experts comes to a close, scientists have sent a letter to Australian officials calling for action to save the world’s reefs, which are being rapidly damaged.
The letter was sent Saturday to Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull imploring his government to do more to conserve the nation’s reefs and curb fossil fuel consumption.
The letter, signed by past and present presidents of the International Society for Reef Studies on behalf of the 2,000 attendees of the International Coral Reef Symposium that was held in Honolulu this week, urged the Australian government to prioritize its Great Barrier Reef.
“This year has seen the worst mass bleaching in history, threatening many coral reefs around the world including the whole of the northern Great Barrier Reef, the biggest and best-known of all reefs,” the letter said. “The damage to this Australian icon has already been devastating. In addition to damage from greenhouse gasses, port dredging and shipping of fossil fuels across the Great Barrier Reef contravene Australia’s responsibilities for stewardship of the Reef under the World Heritage Convention.”
Leaders from the scientific community at the convention in Honolulu said Friday that the “unprecedented” letter was critical to the conservation of the fragile reef habitat.
Scientists are not known for their political activism, said James Cook University professor Terry Hughes, but they felt this crisis warranted such action.
“We are not ready to write the obituary for coral reefs,” said Hughes, who is also the president of the ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies in Australia.
A call to action from three Pacific island nations whose reefs are in the crosshairs of the largest and longest-lasting coral bleaching event in recorded history was presented Friday at the conclusion of the International Coral Reef Symposium in Honolulu. The Associated Press was given advance access to the call for action and the scientific community’s response.
The heads of state from Palau, Micronesia and the Marshall Islands attended the conference and will provide a plan to help save their ailing coral reefs, which are major contributors to their local economies and the daily sustenance of their people. The call to action, signed by the three presidents, asked for better collaboration between the scientific community and local governments, saying there needs to be more funding and a strengthened commitment to protecting the reefs.
“If our coral reefs are further degraded, then our reef-dependent communities will suffer and be displaced,” the letter said. They also called for more integration of “traditional knowledge, customary practices and scientific research” in building a comprehensive coral reef policy.
In response to the letter, the scientific community at the conference said: “We pledge to take up the 13th ICRS Leaders’ Call to Action, and will work together with national leaders of the Federated States of Micronesia, the Republic of Palau, the Republic of the Marshall Islands, and the world to curb the continued loss of coral reefs.”
Bleaching is a process where corals, stressed by hot ocean waters and other environmental changes, lose their colour as the symbiotic algae that lives within them is released. Severe or concurrent years of bleaching can kill coral reefs, as has been documented over the past two years in oceans around the world. Scientists expect a third year of bleaching to last through the end of 2016.
In the northern third of the Great Barrier Reef, close to half of the corals have died in the past three months, said Hughes, who focuses his research there. The area of the reef that suffered most is extremely remote, he said, with no pollution, very little fishing pressure and no coastal development.
“That’s an absolute catastrophe,” Hughes said. “There’s nowhere to hide from climate change.”
But the panel of scientists emphasized the progress they have made over the past 30 years and stressed that good research and management programs for coral reefs are available. The scientists said they just need the proper funding and political will to enact them.
The researchers focused on the economic and social benefits coral reefs contribute to communities across the globe, saying the critical habitats generate trillions of dollars annually but conservation efforts are not proportionately or adequately funded.
In the United States, the budget for the federal coral reef conservation program is set at about $27 million a year, said Bob Richmond, director of the University of Hawaii’s Kewalo Marine Laboratory and convener of this year’s International Coral Reef Symposium.
In Hawaii, he said, the reefs are valued at $34 billion, and the return to the state’s economy is about $360 million annually — meaning the entire nation’s budget for coral reef conservation is less than 10 per cent of the annual return in that one state alone.
Florida, Texas, Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, Guam, American Samoa and the Northern Mariana Islands also have ailing reefs under the budget.
The Coral Reef Conservation Act of 2000, which aimed to protect coral reefs and create programs to manage their conservation, has been plagued by political resistance and a severe lack of funding, said Robert Richmond, former president of the International Society for Reef Studies.
Links
As the largest international gathering of coral reef experts comes to a close, scientists have sent a letter to Australian officials calling for action to save the world’s reefs, which are being rapidly damaged.
The letter was sent Saturday to Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull imploring his government to do more to conserve the nation’s reefs and curb fossil fuel consumption.
The letter, signed by past and present presidents of the International Society for Reef Studies on behalf of the 2,000 attendees of the International Coral Reef Symposium that was held in Honolulu this week, urged the Australian government to prioritize its Great Barrier Reef.
“This year has seen the worst mass bleaching in history, threatening many coral reefs around the world including the whole of the northern Great Barrier Reef, the biggest and best-known of all reefs,” the letter said. “The damage to this Australian icon has already been devastating. In addition to damage from greenhouse gasses, port dredging and shipping of fossil fuels across the Great Barrier Reef contravene Australia’s responsibilities for stewardship of the Reef under the World Heritage Convention.”
Leaders from the scientific community at the convention in Honolulu said Friday that the “unprecedented” letter was critical to the conservation of the fragile reef habitat.
Scientists are not known for their political activism, said James Cook University professor Terry Hughes, but they felt this crisis warranted such action.
“We are not ready to write the obituary for coral reefs,” said Hughes, who is also the president of the ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies in Australia.
A call to action from three Pacific island nations whose reefs are in the crosshairs of the largest and longest-lasting coral bleaching event in recorded history was presented Friday at the conclusion of the International Coral Reef Symposium in Honolulu. The Associated Press was given advance access to the call for action and the scientific community’s response.
The heads of state from Palau, Micronesia and the Marshall Islands attended the conference and will provide a plan to help save their ailing coral reefs, which are major contributors to their local economies and the daily sustenance of their people. The call to action, signed by the three presidents, asked for better collaboration between the scientific community and local governments, saying there needs to be more funding and a strengthened commitment to protecting the reefs.
“If our coral reefs are further degraded, then our reef-dependent communities will suffer and be displaced,” the letter said. They also called for more integration of “traditional knowledge, customary practices and scientific research” in building a comprehensive coral reef policy.
In response to the letter, the scientific community at the conference said: “We pledge to take up the 13th ICRS Leaders’ Call to Action, and will work together with national leaders of the Federated States of Micronesia, the Republic of Palau, the Republic of the Marshall Islands, and the world to curb the continued loss of coral reefs.”
Bleaching is a process where corals, stressed by hot ocean waters and other environmental changes, lose their colour as the symbiotic algae that lives within them is released. Severe or concurrent years of bleaching can kill coral reefs, as has been documented over the past two years in oceans around the world. Scientists expect a third year of bleaching to last through the end of 2016.
In the northern third of the Great Barrier Reef, close to half of the corals have died in the past three months, said Hughes, who focuses his research there. The area of the reef that suffered most is extremely remote, he said, with no pollution, very little fishing pressure and no coastal development.
“That’s an absolute catastrophe,” Hughes said. “There’s nowhere to hide from climate change.”
But the panel of scientists emphasized the progress they have made over the past 30 years and stressed that good research and management programs for coral reefs are available. The scientists said they just need the proper funding and political will to enact them.
The researchers focused on the economic and social benefits coral reefs contribute to communities across the globe, saying the critical habitats generate trillions of dollars annually but conservation efforts are not proportionately or adequately funded.
In the United States, the budget for the federal coral reef conservation program is set at about $27 million a year, said Bob Richmond, director of the University of Hawaii’s Kewalo Marine Laboratory and convener of this year’s International Coral Reef Symposium.
In Hawaii, he said, the reefs are valued at $34 billion, and the return to the state’s economy is about $360 million annually — meaning the entire nation’s budget for coral reef conservation is less than 10 per cent of the annual return in that one state alone.
Florida, Texas, Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, Guam, American Samoa and the Northern Mariana Islands also have ailing reefs under the budget.
The Coral Reef Conservation Act of 2000, which aimed to protect coral reefs and create programs to manage their conservation, has been plagued by political resistance and a severe lack of funding, said Robert Richmond, former president of the International Society for Reef Studies.
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