Tony Abbott has fired a telling shot across Malcolm Turnbull's bow, warning that any energy package agreed to in cabinet must also pass a party room wary of anything approaching a clean energy target or other subsidy scheme for renewables.
It came as the Turnbull government received more bad news in the fortnightly Newspoll series, prompting Mr Abbott to declare a future return to the leadership was possible but would occur only if he was drafted by colleagues, which he described as "almost impossible to imagine".
Tony's climate complex Tony Abbott's speech in London "Daring to doubt" reveals how far the former PM needs to travel to find a receptive audience for his climate change denial. Artist: Matt Davidson
Signalling that Coalition MPs will be no rubber stamp on energy, the
dumped former prime minister said the backbench deserved "plenty of
chance to digest" the formula.
Mr Abbott's blunt message sets the
stage for another showdown over a policy area that has divided moderates
and conservatives within the Coalition for a decade, and become a
constant cipher for simmering leadership rivalries.
Just hours before the Turnbull cabinet was due to discuss the
contentious energy affordability and reliability formula, itself a
reframed clean energy policy due to internal frictions, Mr Abbott used a
regular radio chat with 2GB host Ray Hadley to lay down some political
markers.
Acknowledging the government was now just nine losing
Newspoll surveys away from the 30-poll benchmark Mr Turnbull set as his
trigger for challenging Mr Abbott in September 2015, Mr Abbott
emphasised the importance of "getting the right policy".
"I don't think this is something that should be, as it were, rushed
through, but nevertheless, it's got to be got right," he said.
"We have to get it right, and I hope that a lot of very serious
thought has been given to this matter by [Energy] Minister Josh
Frydenberg; he's a bloke I respect, he's very capable, he's very
talented, and let's see what he comes up with."
Warning shot on energy: former prime minister Tony Abbott, pictured
with then-assistant treasurer Josh Frydenberg at Parliament House in
March 2015. Photo: Alex Ellinghausen
Mr Abbott, who
famously rose to the leadership of the Liberal Party in 2009 at Mr
Turnbull's expense by championing a pivot away from Mr Turnbull's
pro-emissions trading stance, dismissed any suggestion he would
challenge, despite a growing sense that the government was headed
towards defeat.
"This was the test the Prime Minister set for
leaders; it's his test not mine," he said, while pointedly leaving one
avenue open to his return.
"The only way an 'ex' could ever come back is by way of a draft and that's almost impossible to imagine," he said.
"That's a pretty rare and unusual business in politics."
Mr
Abbott's own political hero, John Howard, was drafted back to the top
position in the 1990s after an initially unsuccessful stint as
opposition leader in the 1980s. Mr Howard went on to be prime minister
for almost a dozen years.
Others have also made leadership returns
after leaving or losing, including Kevin Rudd, Kim Beazley and, of
course, Mr Turnbull himself.
Jeff Kennett and Colin Barnett
returned to the party leadership to become Liberal premiers of Victoria
and Western Australia respectively.
Artist rendition of the OCO-2 observatory. JPL/NASA
This much scientists know: Humans pump about 40 billion tons of CO2 into the atmosphere every year. Less clear is where the planet puts it.
About half of it stays in the air, where it adds to the annual, two- to three-part-per-million increase in atmospheric CO2
concentration and the gradual warming of the planet. The other half is
hoovered up by the planet's carbon sinks—oceans and plants—in roughly
equal quantities, slowing its accumulation in the atmosphere. But the
rate of carbon dioxide removal, especially by vegetation, varies a lot
from year to year. What's more, nobody's certain where or how this
reuptake is happening, let alone when the globe's carbon sinks will
overflow.
That’s because existing
carbon-monitoring methods are predominantly ground-based—and in
shockingly short supply. Some 150 of them dot the Earth, sniffing the
air and reporting the carbon content of the local firmament. But to
study how land and ocean sinks vary on a global scale, from season to
season? There just aren't enough.
An artist's rendition of what the OCO-2 spacecraft sees. Debbi McLean/GSFC/NASA-JPL
"They're very
precise, but there's very few of them," says Annmarie Eldering, an
environmental engineer at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. "If you want
to understand how the continent of Africa or the Pacific Ocean relate
to the global carbon cycle, that data set isn't very sensitive." For
decades, climate scientists have been studying the carbon cycle from the
ground, when what they really needed was a 30,000-foot view.
Or better yet: A 2.3-million-foot view.
In July 2014, NASA placed its first and only CO2-monitoring
spacecraft into Earth's orbit, some 435 miles above the planet's
surface. Dubbed the Orbiting Carbon Observatory 2 (OCO-1 died in 2009,
when it failed to launch and crashed into the ocean near Antarctica),
it's spent the last three years lapping the globe in a sun-synchronous orbit, collecting millions of measurements per month.
But OCO-2 doesn't measure CO2
directly. Rather, it measures wavelengths of sunlight reflected off the
Earth's surface.
The relative intensity of those wavelengths indicate
how much CO2 the sunlight passes through in the column of air separating the satellite from the ground below.
Every
16 days, NASA assembles these measurements into a map of sorts—a global
carbon snapshot that helps researchers understand how Earth's carbon
sinks respond to seasonal shifts, human CO2
emissions, and major climate events. "It's a lot more data than has
ever been collected," says Eldering, who serves as OCO-2's deputy
project scientist. "And the fun is in the details of the data."
Those details are the subject of several studies published in this week's issue of Science.
Taken together, they demonstrate OCO-2's abilities by filling important
gaps in scientists' understanding of how carbon shifts between the
Earth, the sky, and the sea—and why it moves the way it does.
In this visualization, reds and yellows depict regions of higher than average CO2, while blues show regions lower than average. Atmospheric CO2 levels plummet during spring and explode in the winter before peaking in April, when decomposing plants and humanity's fuel emissions drive atmospheric carbon levels to their annual maximum. A. Eldering et al., Science (2017)
One study reveals a dramatic ebb and flow in the Northern Hemisphere's carbon cycle: Atmospheric CO2
levels plummet during spring and explode in the winter before peaking
in April, when decomposing plants and humanity's fuel emissions drive
atmospheric carbon levels to their annual maximum. A different investigation showcases OCO-2's ability to track carbon emissions from individual cities and volcanoes. Yet another study
demonstrates the spacecraft's ability to not only detect the faint
fluorescent glow emitted by photosynthesizing plants, but use those
measurements to infer, from hundreds of miles overhead, the amount of
carbon being consumed by vegetation down on Earth.
But
the most impressive study illuminates the impact of a powerful El Niño
event on the global carbon cycle—and how rising temperatures could push
the planet's carbon sinks to their limits.
The 2014–2016 El Niño event was among the strongest in history (Nature, the august scientific journal, referred to it as "Godzilla"),
which meant the world's tropical regions were less wet and a lot hotter
than usual. It also coincided with the highest rate of atmospheric CO2 increase ever recorded.
"El
Niño provided a very big signal," Eldering says. Much of the world
experienced that signal in the form of calamitous weather. But for
OCO-2? "It was this great natural experiment where we had heat and
drought outside the normal range, and we could study how the carbon
system responded," Eldering says. It also let her team peer into the
future: Many climate models suggest the world will be warmer and drier
at the end of the century than it is today. The conditions precipitated
by El Niño served as a dry run.
The event's role in the 2015 carbon spike appears to have been enormous. A study
led by JPL climatologist Junjie Liu combined data from OCO-2 and other
Earth-observing satellites to show that 80 percent of the record rise in
atmospheric CO2 levels could be
attributed to tropical regions of South America, Africa, and Asia
releasing more carbon than usual. Together these areas unloaded about
2.5-gigatons more carbon into the atmosphere in 2015 than in 2011—nearly
one quarter the amount humans typically emit in a year.
This infographic depicts the unusually high levels of carbon dioxide release from three tropical continents during 2015 El Niño. NASA-JPL/Caltech
More
importantly, though, Liu and her colleagues showed that the processes
driving this carbon flux varied from continent to continent. In Asia,
the principal drivers were massive fires. In South America it was a lack
of rain. And Africa? The continent actually saw typical plant growth
but hotter than usual temperatures, which accelerated the decomposition
of plant matter and the release of CO2.
Those
last two cases carry grave implications for the future of Earth's
carbon sinks: The anomalous heat and drought that the researchers
observed in Africa and South America are expected to be commonplace by
the end of this century. If these regions react in 2100 the way they did
in 2015, more of the carbon emissions humans expel into the atmosphere
will stay in the atmosphere. The OCO-2 studies clarify
how carbon's movement between Earth's tropics and the atmosphere
varies, depending on the region you're looking at. That kind of nuance
will be a boon to climate research. "It’s really impressive," says Josep
Canadell, director of the Global Carbon Project. "It produces a novel,
complex picture of the processes behind changes in global CO2
levels. To me, it signals the beginning of a new era of carbon cycle
sciences and the study of the Earth’s carbon sources and sinks."
Not that there isn't a need for more tools. Remember: OCO-2 detects CO2
indirectly, by measuring light; unlike ground-based measurements, you
can't test its accuracy by comparing its readings to known quantities of
gas. "This is my hobby horse, but the Achilles heel of the whole
carbon-tracking endeavor has been an underinvestment in calibrated
measurements," says Pieter Tans, director of NOAA's Carbon Cycle
Greenhouse Gases Group. Remote sensing satellites like OCO-2 offer
climatologists a valuable but insufficient vantage point, he says; a
comprehensive monitoring network will require more greenhouse gas
sensors—not just on the ground, but in the sky. Tans envisions a
scenario in which hundreds of commercial airplanes equipped with sensors
produce a dense vertical profile of atmospheric gasses. A fleet of
high-altitude balloons could collect measurements, as well.
All of which, of course, will require money—a disquieting reality in light of the Trump administration's proposed cuts
to science funding and abandonment of Obama-era climate policies.
"Obviously I'm worried about budgets," Tans says. "Climate research is a
scientific need, but what can I do? Leave the US? Do I have to go to
Europe to get science done?"
Perhaps. But then,
many of today's most important scientific findings are the product of
collaborative, multinational efforts—and the OCO-2 mission is no
exception. NASA's CO2-monitoring spacecraft is but one in a constellation of Earth-observing satellites known in climate circles as the A-Train.
"We’ve benefitted from the fact that cooperation across the world
manifests in this constellation, and that we can use these satellites
together," Eldering says. "If you want to pull things apart—did fire
cause this or did heat and drought cause that—you have to look at as
many pieces of information as possible."
This much scientists know: Humans pump about 40 billion tons of CO2
into the atmosphere every year. To trace its course through the earth,
air, and oceans, they'll need all the sensors, all the satellites, and
all the help they can get.
How Climate Change Is Already Affecting Earth Though the planet has only warmed by one-degree Celsius since the Industrial Revolution, climate change's effect on earth has been anything but subtle. Here are some of the most astonishing developments over the past few years.
A firefighter works to defend homes from the approaching wildfire in Sonoma, Calif., on Saturday. (Jim Urquhart/Reuters)
“NOTHING MORE than ash and bones.”
That grim description
of how some victims were found underscores the horror of the wildfires
that swept through and devastated Northern California.
At least 38
people were killed, including a 14-year-old boy found dead in the driveway of the home he was trying to flee, a 28-year-woman confined to a wheelchair and a couple who recently had celebrated their 75th anniversary.
In addition to the lives lost, approximately 5,700 homes and businesses
were destroyed, including entire neighborhoods turned into smoldering
ruins.
Some 220,000 acres, including prized vineyards, have been
scorched, and the danger is not over, as some fires are still burning
and officials fear the return of winds
could spread more catastrophe.
Fire season is part of life in
California, something that residents know and prepare for after the hot,
dry summer months.
But the events that began last Sunday have been
unprecedented, and so the question that must be confronted is what
caused the deadliest week of wildfires in the state’s history.
Gov.
Jerry Brown (D) pointed the finger at climate change.
“With a warming
climate, dry weather and reducing moisture, these kinds of catastrophes
have happened and will continue to happen and we have to be ready to
mitigate, and it’s going to cost a lot of money,” he said last week.
No
single fire can be specifically linked to climate change, and certainly
other factors, such as increased development or logging and grazing
activities, are involved. But scientists say there is a clear connection
between global warming and the increase in recent years in the severity
and frequency of wildfires in the West.
“Climate change is kind of
turning up the dial on everything,” expert LeRoy Westerling told CBS News. “Dry periods become more extreme. Wet periods become more extreme.”
While
California prepares for what promises to be an arduous rebuilding,
Texas, Florida, Puerto Rico and other places hit by this year’s
unprecedented back-to-back-to-back hurricanes are still mopping up and,
in Puerto Rico’s case,
just beginning to rebuild. So it would seem to be a natural time to
talk about the possible role climate change played in these disasters
and about measures the nation should be taking to slow global warming.
Instead, we have an administration that refuses even to consider the
possibility of a connection, much less talk about solutions. Worse, it
is taking steps in the wrong direction: pulling out of the Paris climate accord, reversing rules on power plant emissions, staffing key agencies with climate-change deniers.
Sadly, that will increase the likelihood and frequency of tragedies such as the fires in California’s wine country.
For atheists (this columnist's mob and guild), all Christians are
equally mystifying. But some Christians are more equally mystifying than
others. Roman Catholics are the most equally mystifying of all.
For
example, atheists are marvelling this week, how can it be that Tony
Abbott, a conspicuous Catholic, can have global warming beliefs so
totally at odds with those of the CEO of his faith, Pope Francis?
Abbott has just given a much reported speech in London, scoffing at climate change science. John Shakespeare
Abbott has just given a much reported, idiocy-pocked,
banality-sprinkled speech in London, scoffing at climate change science.
In this same week Labor leader Bill Shorten has deplored the Turnbull
government's apparent plans to abandon a clean energy target. Shorten
says this is the PM capitulating to Tony Abbott and other "knuckle
draggers" of the coalition parties.
But back to the Tony
Abbott/Pope Francis climate change schism and clash. Isn't it a hallmark
of Catholicism, atheists ask, that rank and file Catholics defer
obediently to the wisdom and the rank of the pope, the Supreme Pontiff
of the Universal Church? (The pope has eight official titles and today's
column will respectfully use some of the biggest and best of them.)
Did
the Pope prick up his ears at reports of Abbott's speech, a delivery so
at odds with his, the Pope's, 2015 encyclical titled Laudato Si? In Laudato Si,
Francis insists that the scientists are right, that global warming is
happening, that it is substantially mankind-driven and that we must act,
now.
What if, now, Abbott is summoned to the Vatican to explain himself?
In one's mind's eye we see him ushered into the papal presence. In
the long walk up to the papal throne one can see his, Abbott's, knuckles
dragging on the Vatican's deep and sumptuous crimson carpets. They, the
two pairs of the recalcitrant's knuckles, leave a parallel trail in the
carpet's sumptuous pile, a bit like wheelchair tracks in snow.
Surely,
at our imagined audience, The Successor of the Prince of Apostles will
present the erring Abbott with a copy of his, His Holiness's, Laudato Si.
Earlier this year, the Pope handed a copy to the Kuckledragger In
Chief, President Trump. But of course to present a novella-length read (Laudato Si is 38,000 words long) to Trump suggests a triumph of optimism over what's likely to happen. At 38,000 words, Laudato Si is longer than C.S. Lewis's The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe. Trump, with the attention span of a soap bubble, is not a reader.
In our imagination we see Abbott, after our imagined audience, leaving the Vatican with a signed copy of Laudato Si. Will he read it? Probably not. A knuckle dragging man like Abbott reads what he wants to read and disregards the rest.
This
seems a shame. Given the climate-based events of this week (including
the Abbott speech, the political imbroglio over the abandoned clean
energy target and the unprecedented fires in California) I have begun
reading Laudato Si.
Once the atheist reader has forgiven
it for one or two small, recurring errors of fact (for example, it says
mistakenly that there is a God and that He made our planet) Laudato Si
is a terrific and often very beautiful read. It bristles with sincere
love of and heartfelt anxiety for our tender and fragile planet we are
so sinfully buggering up.
The sensitively green St Francis of
Assissi is recommended as our role model. "Just as happens when we fall
in love with someone," the impassioned pontiff writes, "whenever he [St
Francis] would gaze at the sun, the moon or the smallest of animals, he
burst into song, drawing all other creatures into his praise. He felt
called to care for all that exists."
Such a conviction cannot be
written off as naive romanticism, for if we approach nature and the
environment without this openness to awe and wonder, if we no longer
speak the language of fraternity and beauty in our relationship with the
world, our attitude will be that of masters, consumers, ruthless
exploiters …"
Thus far today's column has been spiteful to Tony
Abbott. And so in a pathetic, token attempt to appear open-minded about
him I point out that not all climate change deniers are necessarily
knuckle draggers.
For example, few men have walked with their
knuckles further from the ground than Aristotle, the towering
philosopher and scientist of ancient Greece. In the latest online Lapham's Quarterly
the cerebral Lewis Lapham looks at climate change denial - ancient and
modern - and reflects that, "While today environmental scientists warn
of rising sea levels, ancient Athenians worried that the sea was going
to dry up."
U.S. secretary of agriculture Sonny Perdue meets with German minister of
food and agriculture Christian Schmidt, 2017. Photograph by Preston
Keres / USDA Office of Communications.
Plato (left) and Aristotle (right) arguing in The School of Athens, by Raphael, c. 1509–10. Apostolic Palace, Vatican City.
"Any fluctuation in climate was understandably
disastrous for an agricultural society, and natural philosophers took
the issue seriously. Aristotle's pupil Theophrastus discussed permanent
weather change …concluding that if the Cretans are correct about colder
winters, a certain type of wind must be increasing in frequency.
''But Aristotle himself disagreed and argued against climate-change fearmongering in his geological treatise Meteorology, telling us we have nothing to worry about – climate is cyclical."
Perhaps
Aristotle was right, then, in 350BC. But Lapham reminds us that today,
according to NASA, 97 per cent of published scientists agree that global
warming is occurring.
Paris authorities plan to banish all petrol- and
diesel-fueled cars from the world’s most visited city by 2030, Paris
City Hall said on Thursday.
A view shows the skyline with the Eiffel Tower that is seen in the distance, in Paris, France, September 1, 2017. REUTERS/Gonzalo Fuentes
The move marks an acceleration in plans to wean the
country off gas-guzzlers and switch to electric vehicles in a city
often obliged to impose temporary bans due to surges in particle
pollution in the air.
Paris City Hall said in a statement France
had already set a target date of 2040 for an end to cars dependent on
fossil fuels and that this required speedier phase-outs in large cities.
“This is about planning for the long term with
a strategy that will reduce greenhouse gases,” said Christophe
Najdovski, an official responsible for transport policy at the office
of Mayor Anne Hidalgo.
“Transport is one of the
main greenhouse gas producers...so we are planning an exit from
combustion engine vehicles, or fossil-energy vehicles, by 2030,” he told
France Info radio.
The French capital, which
will host the Olympic Games in the summer of 2024 and was host city for
the latest worldwide pact on policies to tame global warming, had
already been eyeing an end to diesel cars in the city by the time of the
Olympics.
Paris City Hall, already under
attack over the establishment of no-car zones, car-free days and fines
for drivers who enter the city in cars that are more than 20 years old,
said it was not using the word “ban” but rather introducing a feasible
deadline by which combustion-engine cars would be phased out.
There
are about 32 million household cars in France, where the population is
about 66 million, according to 2016 data from the Argus, an automobile
industry publication.
Many Parisians do not own
cars, relying on extensive public transport systems and, increasingly,
fast-burgeoning networks offering bikes, scooters and low-pollution
hybrid engine cars for shot-term rental.
The ban on
petrol-fueled, or gasoline-engine vehicles as they are known in the
United States, marks a radical escalation of anti-pollution policy.
Many
other cities in the world are considering similar moves and China, the
world’s biggest polluter after the United States, recently announced
that it would soon be seeking to get rid of combustion-engine cars too.
After more than a century peddling vehicles that pollute the atmosphere, General Motors
is ending its relationship with gasoline and diesel. This morning, the
American automotive giant announced that it is working toward an all-electric, zero-emissions future. That starts with two new, fully electric models next year—then at least 18 more by 2023.
That
product onslaught puts the company at the forefront of an increasingly
large crowd of automakers proclaiming the age of electricity and
promising to move away from gasoline- and diesel-powered vehicles.
In
recent months, Volvo, Aston Martin, and Jaguar Land Rover have announced similar moves.
GM’s declaration, though, is particularly noteworthy because it’s among
the very largest automakers on the planet. It sold 10 million cars last
year, ranging from pickups to SUVs to urban runabouts.
“General
Motors believes the future is all-electric,” says Mark Reuss, the
company’s head of product. “We are far along in our plan to lead the way
to that future world.”
Reuss did not give a
date for the death knell of the GM gas- or diesel-powered car, saying
the transition will happen at different speeds in different markets and
regions. The new all-electric models will be a mix of battery electric
cars and fuel cell-powered vehicles.
To
be sure, GM’s sudden jolt of electricity is planned with its
shareholders in mind. The Trump Administration may be moving to roll
back fuel efficiency requirements in the US, but the rest of the world
is insisting on an electric age.
France, Great Britain, the Netherlands,
and Norway have all said they plan to ban the sale of gas and diesel cars
in the coming decades. More importantly, China—the world’s largest car
market—and India, a rising star, plan to join them. No automaker can
compete globally without a compelling stable of electric cars.
GM intends to grab as large a slice of the Chinese
market as possible. It has previously announced plans to launch 10
electric or hybrid electric cars in the country by 2020. This summer, it
started selling a two-seat EV there, for just $5,300. Last year, it
sold more cars in China (3.6 million) than it did in the US (3 million).
The crucial question for the American automaker will be how, exactly, to make money from all these cars. By one report, GM loses $9,000 on each Chevy Bolt
it sells. Reuss’ strategy hinges on bringing costs down thanks to
steadily dropping battery prices, more efficient motors, and lighter
cars. Massive scale and global supply chains helps, too. “This next
generation will be profitable,” he says. “End of story.”
It's
not impossible. “If they’ve really been laying this groundwork, they
could be closer to not just having this tech but having a profitable and
high volume way of supplying it," says Karl Brauer, an auto industry
analyst with Kelley Blue Book.
General Motors’
history hasn’t been especially kind to electric mobility. Its invention
of the automatic starter helped kill the first wave of electric cars at
the start of the 20th century. This is the company that experimented
with battery power in the EV-1, only to recall the two-seater from its
owners, crush them all, and pile the carcasses up in a junkyard. In the
first years of the 21st century, while Toyota was making hybrids popular
with the Prius, GM was hawking the Hummer.
Over
the past decade, the Detroit giant has positioned itself for a
different sort of future. First came the hybrid electric Chevy Volt.
Then came GM’s great coup, the Chevy Bolt, the 200-mile, $30,000 electric car that hit market long before Tesla’s Model 3. GM is seriously pursuing semi-autonomous and fully driverless cars.
It offers the first car on US roads with vehicle-to-vehicle
communication capability. Now, it talks about its plans to eliminate
vehicle pollution, congestion, and traffic deaths.
“GM
has the ability to get all of us to that future so much faster,” Reuss
says. Now it just has to deliver—and make enough money doing it to stick
around for that future.
For the second time in four years, a large breeding colony of
penguins on Antarctica has collapsed, raising the need for more wildlife
protection as well as action to curb climate change, scientists say.
In
January, the 18,000 pairs of Adelie penguins near France's Dumont
d'Urville research station produced just two surviving chicks for the
season. The penguins typically lay two eggs per pair.
Penguin-cam captures life under Antarctic ice New footage released shows a penguin-eye view under the ice in Antarctic waters using a tiny camera mounted on the back of an Adelie penguin.
Four years earlier, about 20,200 pairs produced no surviving chicks
at all, said WWF and researchers, including Yan Ropert-Coudert at
France's National Centre for Scientific Research.
"Adelie penguins
are one of the hardiest and most amazing animals on our planet," Rod
Downie, head of WWF's polar programs, said in a statement.
"This devastating event contrasts with the image that many people might have of penguins," he said.
"It's more like 'Quentin Tarantino does Happy Feet', with dead penguin chicks strewn across a beach in Adelie Land," he said referring to the director of Pulp Fiction and the Hollywood animated blockbuster about penguins.
Dr Ropert-Coudert said unusual shifts in sea-ice cover appear to be the main cause of both breeding collapses.
"Meteorological factors - driven by large-scale climate changes -
that are behind the massive failure are out of the norm, at least from
what we know of the normal speed of changes in the past," he told
Fairfax Media.
An Adelie penguin with its dead chick. Photo: Y. Ropert-Couder/ CNRS/ IPEV
In the first instance, the season began with the largest sea ice
extent measured in the satellite era, while in the second period, the
sea ice was unusually constant through the season. In both instances,
adult penguins had to travel further to forage, leaving their chicks to
starve.
Climate change appears to be affecting many other species,
including shy albatrosses, which are having to fly further to feed.
Increased intensity of rain events also appears to be affecting the
integrity of their nests, prompting groups including the WWF to intervene by supplying more rigid nests for the birds.
Adelie penguins have suffered colony collapses twice in the past four years. Photo: Greg and Kate Bourne/WWF Australia
For the Adelie penguins, environmental groups are hoping the
attention to the breeding failures will spur greater protection of the
waters off East Antarctica, when delegates from 25 nations and the
European Union meet in Hobart next week.
A proposal for a new
marine protected area (MPA) is on the agenda of the meeting of the
Commission for the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources.
A waddle of Adelie penguins in Antarctica. Photo: Cheryl Ramalho
Such a new zone "would not prevent massive failure events like these
but they would protect the species and their resources from further
anthropogenic impacts that could superimpose on [them]", Dr
Ropert-Coudert said.
Adelie penguin chicks starved to death at Dumont d'Urville in January. Photo: Y. Ropert-Couder/ CNRS/ IPEV
A dead Adelie penguin chick is food for another bird. Photo: Y. Ropert-Couder/ CNRS/ IPEV
Adelie penguins - named in 1840 by French
explorer Jules Dumont d'Urville after his wife, Adele - are generally
faring well in East Antarctica but are in decline in the Antarctic
Peninsula. The peninsula has had some of the most rapid increases in
temperatures from global warming anywhere on the planet.
WWF said expectations were high that next week's gathering would
support the creation of the new MPA. The plan is backed by Australia and
France with the EU, and has been discussed by the commission for eight
years.
The proposal originally comprised seven large marine areas
off the coast of East Antarctica but was later cut to four. WWF said it
was likely only three of those areas - MacRobertson, Drygalski, and the
D'Urville Sea-Mertz region, where the Petrel Island Adelie colony is
located - will be adopted this year.
Last year, the commission adopted the Ross Sea MPA, the largest protected area in the world. (See map below.)
Setting aside the
D'Urville Sea Mertz region as off limits to krill fisheries will be
particularly important for protecting the foraging and breeding grounds
of the Adelie penguins, WWF said.
