Climate Change: Australia's Election Has Far-Reaching Consequences

Forbes - James Ellsmoor

Scott Morrison, then Treasurer, brings a lump of coal to Parliament during question time, where he defended coal as a power source of the future, February 2017. Andrew Meares

Australia’s national anthem reflects upon the nation’s environmental wealth:

Our home is girt by sea,
Our land abounds in nature's gifts,
Of beauty, rich and rare.

However, despite boasting an incredibly biodiverse environment and having the world’s largest biogenic structure in the Great Barrier Reef defining the nation’s north-eastern coast, Australia is an environmental paradox.
Australia’s recent federal election was touted as the “climate change election” with many seeing it as a potential turning point that could change the nation’s environmental policies for the better.
In a surprising twist, Prime Minister Scott Morrison and his conservative coalition were re-elected. But how does this affect anyone outside of Australia, and what effects could it have on the environment?

Environmental Context
The Paris Agreement is an agreement within the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), dealing with greenhouse-gas-emissions mitigation, adaptation, and finance, adopted by consensus at the COP 21 conference in 2015. At its core, the Agreement outlined how nations would collaborate to reduce carbon emissions with the aim of keeping global warming below 2°C.
Data from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) provided the scientific background for the Paris Agreement and was integral in helping form policy decisions to reduce carbon emissions. 196 nations took part in deliberations and as of May 2019, 195 are signatories. Each country committed to various changes in policy that would lead to emissions reduction and therefore help mitigate the damages from the upcoming climate crisis.
As part of its COP21 commitments, the Australian government pledged to reduce their carbon emissions by 26%-28% on 2005 levels by 2030 as well as invest in renewable technology. Although some experts believed the target to be low, pointing towards evidence that Australia could reach a 45% reduction, there was hope that Australia would become a leader in the fight against climate change. However, as watchdogs have pointed out, the country’s emissions have continued to rise with little to no change in their policies.

Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison, left, holds his wife's, Jenny, hand as an anti-coal mining protester runs in from the right after Morrison voted in a federal election in Sydney. The parties have changed their rules to make the process of lawmakers replacing a prime minister more difficult. ASSOCIATED PRESS

A Tale Of Two Countries
Despite being condemned by both the United Nations and the IPCC for continued inaction, newly re-elected Prime Minister Scott Morrison has repeatedly told Australian media outlets that the country is set to reach their emissions reduction targets “in a canter”.
 Government reports continue to espouse the party line that Australia is on track to meet its targets, but a range of studies have shown that the country has continued to pollute and is therefore likely to miss their emissions target.
Closely aligned with the United States, Australia has joined them in pro-coal events and has backed up the Trump administration’s stance on “clean-coal”, referring to the use of coal power-plants in tandem with technology that mitigates the environmental damage they produce.
However, contrary to what the moniker implies “clean-coal” is anything but, as it still produces high levels of carbon emissions. Seen as a cost-inefficient option that goes against current energy trends, “clean-coal” has been dismissed as a viable option by nations looking to curb their carbon emissions as well as transition away from fossil fuels.
The US, which publicly withdrew from the Paris Agreement in 2017, has received considerable support from Australia. Both countries have continued to invest in coal power, with Australia looking to open the world’s largest open-air coal mine adjacent to the Great Barrier Reef.
During COP24 discussions held last year in Fiji, both countries reiterated their commitments to coal and explained that they had no plans to phase out their coal-fired power-plants despite calls from China and Fiji for greater accountability from developed nations and a marked reduction in coal power generation.
With an economy heavily invested in the mining industry, Australia has found itself at odds with a world looking to mitigate climate change. In recent years, the Australian government has found itself blurring the lines in the media as it attempts to protect its economic interests.
From holding back emissions data to censorship of international reports, the government has struggled to admit their own responsibility in causing environmental damage.

Controversial Policy Decisions
Australia’s policy decisions have indicated that the nation’s leaders are still in denial as to their non-compliance to the Paris Agreement and the effects of fossil fuels on the environment. In 2017, then Federal Energy Minister Josh Frydenburg announced changes to the country’s Clean Energy Finance Corporation (CEFC), a $10 billion AUD tax-funded loan facility which promoted investment in green technology.
Under new regulations, the CEFC would be allowed to invest in ventures that previously did not meet its emissions targets, allowing the fund to be used to research carbon-capture and clean coal technology as well as help finance the construction of new coal power-plants. Many expressed outrage over what was seen as a blatant attempt to prop up the coal and natural gas industries at the expense of more sustainable energy sources.

Open cut black coal min in Emu creek of Liddell part in Hunter Valley region, NSW, Australia. Huge fossil fuel extraction operation in NSW. Getty

The Renewable Energy Target (RET) has been a bright spot for the nation’s energy sector. By providing financial benefits for households and companies that installed renewable energy, the RET was created to promote investment in renewables and help reduce overall emissions.
A successful nationwide implementation led to noticeable drops in emissions and prices, with the Renewable Energy Target now being seen as the catalyst for a renewable energy transition.
However, with the RET’s end date looming, politicians looked to find it a suitable replacement that would ensure Australia continues to build upon renewables and cutting emissions at a rate compatible with the Paris Agreement.
The Morrison government revealed they have no plans to implement a new renewable energy policy and when queried about it, current Energy Minister and renewable energy and climate change skeptic Angus Taylor told Parliament: “The truth of the matter is the renewable energy target is going to wind down from 2020, it reaches its peak in 2020, and we won’t be replacing that with anything.”
The previous administration had already discussed implementing a National Energy Guarantee (NEG), to replace the Renewable Energy Target.
The NEG would merge energy reliability and a reduction in carbon emissions and could be used to help transition the nation away from fossil fuels and towards renewables. However, it was criticized for not being ambitious enough by energy experts and was seen as a government ploy to protect coal-fired power stations whilst flaunting an eco-friendly tag.
A study commissioned by Greenpeace Australia illustrated the issues with the NEG, showing that wholesale power prices would increase over time despite an initial drop and ensure no change in the share of renewable energy in the country’s energy portfolio.
In an interview with The Guardian, Oliver Yates, the former head of the CEFC expressed his disappointment: “It’s absolutely of no benefit to the national transition away from emissions. [The NEG] doesn’t do anything other than create a stable emissions profile for existing coal-fired power stations.”
Mr. Yates also pointed out the fact that under the NEG, polluting utility companies had a decade to reduce their emissions and that there was no mention of additional implementation of renewable energy projects.
Amidst criticism from all sides, the NEG was abandoned, leaving many worried that a transition away from fossil fuels may not happen. In August last year, the Energy Security Board warned that without the RET or the NEG, Australia was set to fall short of its emissions target.

Sheep drink imported water from a trough at a farm in Wandandian, New South Wales. In the world's driest inhabited continent, enduring a devastating drought that arrived in mid-winter, private action to prepare for climate change contrasts with years of division on energy and environmental policies. Australia's latest climate casualties are its farmers, who are being forced to slaughter livestock and watch crops wither amid one of the worst droughts on record. © 2018 Bloomberg Finance LP

An Inconvenient Truth
Despite successive governments assuring the Australian public that the country was doing its best to reduce emissions, the numbers have revealed an inconvenient truth.
A 2018 report by the Climate Action Tracker concluded that: “Australia’s emissions from fossil fuels and industry continue to rise and, based on the most recent quarterly inventory, are now 6% above 2005 levels and increasing at around 1% since 2014.
Under current policies, these emissions are headed for an increase of 9% above 2005 levels by 2030, rather than the 15–17% decrease in these emissions required to meet Australia’s Paris Agreement target. This means Australia’s emissions are set to far outpace its 'Insufficient' 2030 target.”
The “Climate Change Election” was meant to change Australia’s environmental future - and it certainly has.
Since being re-elected Prime Minister Scott Morrison has retained Angus Taylor as the nation’s Energy Minister, suggesting that his government does not intend to put forth any new strong environmental policies. A country itself already experiencing the worst impacts of climate change, suffering from drought, coral bleaching of an unprecedented scale, loss of biodiversity as well as poor environmental management, Australia has positioned itself at odds with global trends.
Where nations are cutting emissions and investing in cleaner futures, Australia has reduced funding for climate change solutions and refused to commit to additional emissions cutbacks.
Whilst politicians can continue to posture and engage in doublespeak, the impacts of climate change will continue to be felt.
The Australian government’s lack of interest in being part of a global solution regarding climate change should not be seen as a new development, but rather one of its many examples of hubris.

Links

• Drought-hit Australia to import wheat for first time in 12 years
• Great Barrier Reef suffers 89% collapse in new coral after bleaching events
• Koalas are functionally extinct
• Australia is a global top-ten deforester – and Queensland is leading the way
• Pacific leaders urge Scott Morrison to act on climate emergency following election win
• Budget 2019: Coalition cuts climate solutions fund by $70m a year
• Australia turns back on allies as it refuses to cut emissions above Paris pledge
• Blockchain Is The Next Big Thing For Renewable Energy
• Global Population Without Access To Electricity Drops By 400 Million Since 2010
• Are Electric Vehicles Really Better For The Environment?
• Smart Cities: The Future Of Urban Development
• Governments Look To "Smart Islands" For High Tech And Low Carbon Solutions
• Florida Cities Launch Contest To Find Urgent Climate Change Solutions

Climate Change Is Already Affecting Global Food Production—Unequally

University of Minnesota

Global map of changes in wheat yield on average annually. Units are measured by tons per hectare per year. Credit: Deepak Ray.

The world's top 10 crops— barley, cassava, maize, oil palm, rapeseed, rice, sorghum, soybean, sugarcane and wheat—supply a combined 83 percent of all calories produced on cropland.
Yields have long been projected to decrease in future climate conditions.
Now, new research shows climate change has already affected production of these key energy sources—and some regions and countries are faring far worse than others.
Published in PLOS ONE, the University of Minnesota-led study, conducted with researchers from the University of Oxford and the University of Copenhagen, used weather and reported crop data to evaluate the potential impact of observed climate change.
The researchers found that:

• observed climate change causes a significant yield variation in the world's top 10 crops, ranging from a decrease of 13.4 percent for oil palm to an increase of 3.5 percent for soybean, and resulting in an average reduction of approximately one percent (-3.5 X 10e13 kcal/year) of consumable food calories from these top 10 crops;
• impacts of climate change on global food production are mostly negative in Europe, Southern Africa, and Australia, generally positive in Latin America, and mixed in Asia and Northern and Central America;
• half of all food-insecure countries are experiencing decreases in crop production—and so are some affluent industrialized countries in Western Europe;
• contrastingly, recent climate change has increased the yields of certain crops in some areas of the upper Midwest United States.

"There are winners and losers, and some countries that are already food insecure fare worse," says lead author Deepak Ray of the University of Minnesota's Institute on the Environment, whose high-resolution global crop statistics databases have also been used to help to identify how global crop production changes over time.
These findings indicate which geographical areas and crops are most at risk, making them relevant to those working to achieve the U.N. Sustainable Development Goals of ending hunger and limiting the effects of climate change.
Insights like these lead to new questions and crucial next steps.
"This is a very complex system, so a careful statistical and data science modeling component is crucial to understand the dependencies and cascading effects of small or large changes," says co-author Snigdhansu Chatterjee of the University of Minnesota's School of Statistics.
The Institute's Global Landscapes Initiative, whose contributors to this study included Ray, Paul West and James Gerber, has previously produced global scale findings that have been put to use by international organizations such as the U.N., World Bank and Brookings in evaluation of global food security and environmental challenges.
The scholars say this report has implications for major food companies, commodity traders and the countries in which they operate, as well as for citizens worldwide.
"The research documents how change is already happening, not just in some future time," says Ray.

Links

• Climate extremes explain 18%-43% of global crop yield variations
• Extreme weather and geopolitics major drivers of increasing 'food shocks'
• Climate change means land use will need to change to keep up with global food demand, researchers say
• Inclusion of a crop model in a climate model
• When it comes to variations in crop yield, climate has a big say
• Climate change will cut crop yields: study

Kids Suing The US Over Climate Change Are Getting Global Support

Quartz - Ephrat Livni

“Fridays for Future” school strike in Vienna, Austria on May 31, 2019.

In 2015, when a group of 21 children and teens first sued the US government over climate change, their claim in Juliana v. US was not totally new—youth in Uganda and the Netherlands had filed somewhat similar environmental suits—but it seemed a little strange.
Shouldn’t these kids be playing video games or something, doing pretty much anything but litigating to save the planet?
Now, the plaintiffs in Juliana v. US are part of an increasingly vocal global movement of young environmental activists leading the fight against climate catastrophe, most visible among them Swedish teen Greta Thunberg, who has chided world leaders for failing to take action. And they are banding together.
In March, Thunberg inspired a worldwide protest, with kids skipping school to make the point that their future is on the line because of climate change. On June 1, youth activists will host nearly 100 coordinated press conferences across the US and worldwide announcing new local actions to fight the climate crisis in a show of solidarity with the American plaintiffs who have a hearing before the US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit on June 4.
The young Americans, some of whom are now adults, argue that they have a constitutional right to a stable climate that sustains life on Earth. While this right is obviously not enumerated in the US Constitution, they say that it is implied by the document.
By adopting policies that promote fossil fuel use, leading to the emission of carbon dioxide at rates that change the climate, despite knowing these energy sources are warming the planet, the federal government violates “the youngest generation’s constitutional rights to life, liberty, and property,” they wrote in their 2015 complaint (pdf). The plaintiffs also contend that the government is failing to protect essential resources held in trust for the public.
Their case—which originated in Oregon district court—has been surprisingly successful so far, though the government has fought the kids hard.
The matter has survived efforts to dismiss it by two presidential administrations, that of Barack Obama and now of Donald Trump. The fossil fuel industry briefly intervened in the case, joining the government as defendants before asking the courts to release them from the matter, a motion which was granted in 2017.
The case was set for trial twice in 2018, but the Trump administration repeatedly moved for delay and dismissal.
The kids have used social media to get out their message, naturally. When their trial was delayed in February 2017, for example, they posted using the hashtag #RatherBeInCourt.
Last July, the US Supreme Court unanimously ruled in favor of the plaintiffs, denying the administration’s application for a stay and calling a request to review the case before the district court hears all of the facts at trial “premature.” The high court again denied a Trump administration request for a stay in November.
But the feds fought on and the Department of Justice immediately filed more motions to quash the case at the district and circuit court level. The government has gone to great lengths to avoid a trial that will no doubt highlight the science behind climate change and reveal the extent to which representatives failed to act on information about environmental dangers.
The hearing next week before the appeals court will determine whether the plaintiffs can finally take the case to trial and, if so, whether various federal agencies will be subject to an injunction while the trial takes place, halting the production of new fossil fuel extractions while the matter is heard.
If they succeed, these young plaintiffs will be setting a dramatic precedent in the US. As they say on their website, ”Like Brown v. Board of Education did for civil rights, Juliana v. United States has the potential to become the landmark climate change case of our country’s history.”
This bold claim has merit. If the kids succeed in the US, they create a basis for other cases like theirs in municipalities and states across the nation.
Though the litigation is complicated, Juliana v. US has already gone much further than the US government would have liked. A win would mean that American states and municipalities would have to rethink their obligations as trustees of public resources or risk facing similarly complex litigation, and it could change the way business is done.
Certainly, the plaintiffs have convinced many that their case matters.
Ahead of the June 4 hearing, environmental groups, businesses, members of Congress, the League of Women Voters, public health experts, history professors, and of course lawyers all argued the validity of their claims in amicus briefs (32,340 young people (pdf) were also represented in such a brief). A filing on behalf of law professors (pdf) supporting the plaintiffs argues that the constitutional claim in the case is indeed valid.
They write, “The District Court was correct to find that a stable climate is essential to ordered liberty…Indeed, as the District Court found, a stable climate system is quite literally the foundation of society, without which there would be neither civilization nor progress.”

Links
Children Climate Change Legal Action:

• Uganda (pdf)
• Netherlands (pdf)
• Pakistan
• India (pdf)
• Portugal

Other legal links:

• Brace For Impact - Climate Change Litigation Is Fast Approaching
• Torres Strait Islanders Ask UN To Hold Australia To Account On Climate ‘Human Rights Abuses’
• Torres Strait Islanders Accuse Government Of Human Rights Breach Over Climate Inaction
• Climate Change Activists Worldwide Look To Courts As A Powerful New Ally
• Climate Change - The Gathering Legal And Policy Storm In Australia And Its Impact On The Energy And Resources Sector
• Climate Change Could Destroy His Home In Peru. So He Sued An Energy Company In Germany

Australia's Greenhouse Gas Emissions Up For Four Years In A Row

Sydney Morning Herald - Peter Hannam

Australia's greenhouse gas emissions in 2018 rose for a fourth year in a row, an increase at odds with the country's Paris climate pledge, according to a government submission to the United Nations.
The National Inventory Report to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change showed emissions last year were 537 million tonnes of carbon dioxide-equivalent (which include all greenhouse gases), based on preliminary figures.

Yallourn Power Station in Victoria's Latrobe Valley. The power sector has been one of the few to show falling emissions as renewables increase their share. Credit: AAP

That tally, which includes changes to land-use and forestry, was up 0.4 per cent from 2017's 534.7 million tonnes of CO2-e.
The Morrison government is due to release its full figures for 2018 emissions by the end of this month. The UN report provides an indication of which way the trajectory will be pointed.

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Australia's emissions have risen for the past four years

Source: United Nations Climate Change/Australia 2019 National Inventory Report

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The responsibility for emissions now lie with Angus Taylor, who has had emissions added to his energy portfolio following the Coalition's election win earlier this month.
"This government has committed to a sensible and achievable emissions reduction target," Mr Taylor said. "We have a strong track record of meeting and beating our targets."
"Australia has over-achieved on our commitment under the Kyoto Protocol, something few countries have done."
Australia pledged at the 2015 Paris climate summit to lower emissions by 26 to 28 per cent from 2005 levels by 2030.
About half that abatement effort, though, will come from the use of so-called carry-over credits generated by exceeding targets during the Kyoto periods.
Labor campaigned on a promise to achieve a 45 per cent reduction on 2005 levels without using Kyoto credits.

On the rise
Tim Baxter, a lecturer at the University of Melbourne, said it was not surprising 2018 showed an increase in annual emissions since "there's no meaningful policy to reduce them".
He added that with fugitive emissions increasing rapidly in particular "there's no reason to think" 2019's emissions won't make it five years in a row of rising pollution.

Land-use gain
The government's emissions figures would have shown a faster increase if not for land use, land-use change and forestry - known by the acronym LULUCF - serving as a carbon sink for the past four years. The report noted that Australia's forest area had increased by an estimated 772,000 hectares in 2017, and by 4.6 million hectares since 2010.
Those estimates, though, have been disputed by some environmental groups. They point to the Queensland government data showing a rapid rise in land-clearing in recent years, while NSW has also loosened its native vegetation laws in the past two years.
Senator Sarah Hanson-Young, the Greens environment spokeswoman, said pollution was "skyrocketing under the Liberals as the climate emergency threatening our country and planet continues".
“This is a slap in the face to those who say the election means the climate wars are over," Senator Hanson-Young said. “Our environment laws need fixing so pollution monstrosities like Adani and oil drilling in the [Great Australian] Bight are assessed for their climate impact."
Meanwhile in Brisbane, Australia’s chief scientist Alan Finkel on Wednesday said the Morrison government should use vehicle emissions standards to help meet climate targets if it won’t introduce a price on carbon.
Speaking at the annual APPEA conference, Dr Finkel said he hoped the government would look at all means of achieving its Paris target, adding "an alternative to a carbon tax is regulated requirements".
"So if you think about transport, just the need to have an emissions cap on carbon dioxide per kilometre, would be a big part of an emissions reduction policy," he said.
According to the most recently released quarterly greenhouse gas figures for Australia, the fastest growing sources of pollution were so-called fugitive emissions from the energy sector - such as extraction of fossil fuels - and from processing of gas.
The electricity sector reported a 3.2 per cent year-on-year drop in emissions for the 12 months to September 2018 but remained the largest source, accounting for about a third of Australia's total.

Links

• Australia Keeps Voting For Coal, But Investors Are Quietly Abandoning Plans For New Mines
• Australians Could Have Saved Over $1 Billion In Fuel If Car Emissions Standards Were Introduced 3 Years Ago
• National Grid Has More Immediate Challenges Than Electric Cars
• Renewable Energy Could Save $160 Trillion In Climate Change Costs by 2050
• Poll Shows 50% Of Australians Support Shifting All Sales Of New Cars To Electric Vehicles By 2025
• Four Corners Report Shows Climate Change Concerns Heating Up Ahead Of Federal Election
• 'Woefully Dirty': Government Accused Over Australia's Failure To Cut Vehicle Emissions
• 'Coal To Blame' For Last Year's Record Emissions From Energy
• Australian Faces Free Trade Agreement Pressure To Cut Emissions
• Expanding Gas Mining Threatens Our Climate, Water And Health
• 'Death blow': Corals, algae don't acclimatise to more acidic seas

'Death Blow': Corals, Algae Don't Acclimatise To More Acidic Seas

Sydney Morning Herald - Peter Hannam

Coral and algae species subjected to more acidic seawater showed no acclimatisation to the new conditions for over a year, a new study has found, suggesting that vulnerable reefs may not be able adapt fast enough to cope with climate change.
With oceans absorbing about 22 million tonnes of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere a day, seas have already become about 30 per cent more acidic over the past two centuries.
Shell-forming creatures from oysters to types of plankton are increasingly at risk from the changes, which have been called the "evil twin" - along with higher temperatures - of climate change.

Research into coral reefs extends from studying how they cope with higher temperature to what happens when waters turn more acidic.Credit: Jason South

A team of scientists exposed four coral and two coralline, or calcifying algal, species to varying ocean acidity levels for a year at the Moorea reef in French Polynesia to test their responses.
They found "completely no change over a year", said Christopher Cornwall, a researcher based at Victoria University in Wellington, and an author of the paper published in Nature Climate Change on Tuesday.
"We expected that over the course of the year they would slowly get acclimatised," Dr Cornwall said. "In reality they displayed the same responses at the start and the end of the experiment."

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The acidity of waters around Australia is increasing (pH is decreasing)
pH Australian waters

Source: CSIRO

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Since some coral species are known to be more tolerant of lower pH water than others, they would be expected to become more dominant over time as ocean acidification increases - provided they can cope with the marine heatwaves that trigger bleaching events.
The stability of the reefs themselves, though, could be undermined if the calcifying algae become less productive, Dr Cornwall said.
"The reef itself will start to erode as all of those calcifying organisms are no longer producing that calcium carbonate," Dr Cornwall said. "Ocean acidification is kind of like the death blow after these warming events  have been happening ... there's nowhere to get refuge from that."
Ken Anthony, principal research scientist at the Australian Institute of Marine Science, said ocean acidification was a "more precise indicator than temperature" of what's happening in the biosphere as CO2 levels rise.
On current emissions trajectories, global ocean pH levels could drop to as low as 7.8, Dr Anthony said. Even at 8, all sorts of physiological changes can be expected, including entire ocean food chains being placed at risk.
"Even fish larvae's nervous systems get affected [by more acidic water]," he said. "Macro algae also grows faster so that suddenly weedy algae are much more successful in over-growing corals."
Dr Anthony, who was not one of the paper's authors, said he was "not surprised by these results", adding it "would have been wonderful" if adaptation had happened so fast.
He noted the study had focused on adult corals and algae, and future studies could be extended to look at juvenile and larvae "that are often more susceptible". Longer studies would also be helpful.
A separate study by AIMS researchers, meanwhile, has found the relatively pristine and remote coral reefs of Western Australia are increasingly being affected by heat stress and coral bleaching.
"For most (75 per cent) reef systems with long-term data (of five to 26 years), mean coral cover is currently at (or near) the lowest on record and a full recovery is unlikely if disturbances continue to intensify with climate change," the paper found.
Research should focus on identifying which reef systems are "least susceptible to future disturbances" and they should be preserved "through networks of protected areas", it said.

Links

• Ocean Acidification
• Resistance to ocean acidification in coral reef taxa is not gained by acclimatization
• Marine heatwaves threaten global biodiversity and the provision of ecosystem services
• Australian Institute of Marine Science
• New report shows record low coral cover at many WA reefs
• The state of Western Australia’s coral reefs
• NSW's threatened species rise, climate impacts increase, major report finds

The Smithsonian’s Renewed Fossil Hall Sends A Forceful Message About Climate Change

Washington Post - Sarah Kaplan

A giant sea turtle that lived 83 to 81 million years ago, found in Kansas, is part of the “David H. Koch Hall of Fossils: Deep Time” exhibition at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History. The fossil hall will open June 8 after a five-year renovation. (Katherine Frey/The Washington Post)

As a young paleontologist, Kirk Johnson traveled to the Arctic to excavate fossils from 50 million years ago, a time when the air was thick with carbon dioxide and so warm that even the North Pole had no ice.
Johnson and his colleagues dug up fossilized crocodiles, turtles, and palm trees.
“Palm trees!” Johnson recalled. “In the Arctic! . . . It blew my mind that the Earth could change that much.”
Since that expedition in the 1980s, global carbon dioxide concentrations have soared to levels not seen in the history of humankind. New temperature records are set almost every year. Savannah is turning to desert, coasts are consumed by floods, the Arctic is losing ice once more.
Those ancient palms are not only evidence of how much the planet has changed in the past, Johnson said. They also are a key to understanding the changes we see today.
When the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History took on the absorbing task of revamping its celebrated fossil hall, it was “dead obvious” that this would have to be one of the exhibit’s central themes, said Johnson, who became the museum’s director in 2012.
“Paleontology is the backstory to what’s happening today,” he said. “We have a responsibility to present that science to the nation . . . and to make clear the implications for the future.”
The “David H. Koch Hall of Fossils — Deep Time,” which opens to the public on June 8, is a radically new kind of natural history exhibition. It features all the classic beasts of a traditional paleontology hall: a colossal mammoth skeleton, a long-necked diplodocus, a ferocious new T-rex. But every fossil is presented in the context of Earth’s past climates and its present crisis.
Although the science of climate change has been settled for decades, exhibitions on the subject have prompted political debates. In 2007, a former administrator at the National Museum of Natural History alleged that an exhibition on the Arctic had been “toned down” by museum officials who feared angering Congress and the administration of President George W. Bush. (While the Smithsonian is not part of the government, it gets more than 60 percent of its funding from tax dollars.) The exhibition, which ran for six months in 2006, discussed the Arctic’s shrinking ice and snow cover but made no mention of what was causing the changes.
Most of the planning on the new fossil hall was done during the Obama administration, which made action against climate change one of its top priorities. But even after the inauguration of President Trump, who has questioned the scientific consensus on the subject, Johnson said that there was never any hesitation about the exhibition’s approach.
“I have no doubt that the kind of individual who is inclined to deny climate change will find it in their soul to do that to this exhibit,” he said. “But this is basic science. . . . We’re actually looking at facts about our planet’s history, and then just saying it looks like these facts have implications for the future.”

A diplodocus that lived 152 million years ago looms over the National Museum of Natural History. (Katherine Frey/The Washington Post)

The new fossil hall takes a radical new approach to discussing Earth's past by using paleontology to explain modern day climate change. (Katherine Frey/The Washington Post)

The fossil hall will reopen June 8. The original was open from 1911 to 2014, without undergoing a major overhaul. (Katherine Frey/The Washington Post)

Sarah George, the executive director of the Natural History Museum of Utah, said that the National Museum of Natural History’s approach is “quite new” for the museum world. As president of the Association of Science Museum Directors and a board member for the Association of Science and Technology Centers, George has seen many institutions add climate change installations in the past few decades. But no museum she knows of has so completely integrated an environmental message into one of its main exhibits. Especially not one containing the crown jewels of any natural history museum: its dinosaurs.
“I have to give them kudos,” George said, “for less focus on didactic interpretations [of the fossils] and more focus on what we really need to be thinking about today.”
Gigantic black pillars around the hall mark displays about mass extinctions, including the asteroid impact that killed the dinosaurs 66 million years ago and humans’ devastation of animals in recent history. A scale model of a Virginia coal mine explains the origin of the word “fossil” in fossil fuels — coal beds are essentially compressed layers of dead plants, and often preserve the outlines of ancient plants in exquisite detail. Videos show stories from the sinking bayous of Louisiana, a Chicago neighborhood where residents have withstood brutal heat waves and a Texas farm that is testing a more sustainablemethod of growing crops that could reduce erosion and suck up carbon. An interactive game teaches visitors about the effects of climate change on their favorite things — soccer, chocolate, beaches, flowers — and discusses ways people can reduce their environmental impacts.
The cumulative effect is that no person will be able to walk through the hall, which Johnson said is the most visited room at the most visited science museum in the world, without contemplating climate change and humans’ role in it.
“People do come for the dinosaurs,” said Siobhan Starrs, the project manager for the exhibit. “And they’re going to get a lot more than dinosaurs.”
The old fossil hall was open from 1911 to 2014, without undergoing a major overhaul. Many of the original fossil mounts predated the modern understanding of dinosaurs, and new displays were added piecemeal, leading to an exhibition that lacked an overarching theme.
Partial updates addressed some issues, but new discoveries in paleontology kept cropping up even faster. Some of the most important realizations about dinosaurs — that they’re the ancestors of birds, that an asteroid strike ended their reign — were made after the hall was last renovated, in the early 1980s.
New research on Earth’s history revealed a past that was far more dramatic than most people knew. Chief among the new discoveries is an event called the Paleocene Eocene Thermal Maximum, a specialty of curator Scott Wing.
Some 50 million years ago, well after the demise of the dinosaurs, temperatures rose as much as 10 degrees Fahrenheit in a matter of a few thousand years — a rate of warming faster and more dramatic than at any time in history, except the present.
“This [exhibition] is very much a creation of the scientific knowledge of the past 20 or 30 years,” Wing said. “To understand that the magnitude of human effects are really on a scale that is geological.”
Last year, Wing worked at the National Museum of Natural History with a group of paleoclimate experts to develop a graph of Earth’s average temperatures over the past half-billion years. It is featured in the center of the exhibit, with text pointing out the link between periods of dramatic warmth and high levels of carbon dioxide.
In the past, that carbon came from erupting volcanoes. Now, the exhibition notes, it comes from us.

A pterodactyl is suspended above the gallery at the National Museum of Natural History. (Katherine Frey/The Washington Post)

Links

• Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History
• Climate change could render many of Earth’s ecosystems unrecognizable
• Past and future global transformation of terrestrial ecosystems under climate change
• A mystery dinosaur in the nation’s basement
• How do you make a predatory dinosaur relatable? Show it as a parent.
• This ancient climate catastrophe is our best clue about Earth’s future

Climate Index Reveals A Summer Of Record Extremes

Insurance Business Australia - Mina Martin

New Climate Index  The Actuaries Institute has developed a new tool for monitoring climate trends. The Australian Actuaries Climate Index (AACI) tracks changes in the frequency of extreme high and low temperatures, heavy precipitation, dry days, strong wind, and changes in sea level to help people understand how extreme weather – and risk levels – may be shifting as a result of climate change. Elayne Grace, Actuaries Institute chief executive, said the index “will assist businesses to assess and report risks from climate change, and Australians more generally will be able to look at the data and see what’s going on.” Read more

Australia has experienced a season of extremes last summer, with the Australian Actuaries Climate Index posting a record-number of hot days, extreme rainfall in tropical regions, as well as ongoing drought in some parts of NSW.
The climate index showed a 200% rise in the frequency of extreme high temperatures in the summer of 2018-19 compared to the reference period 1980-2010.
“The most recent summer has been the hottest on record, both in terms of average temperatures as reported by the Bureau of Meteorology, and in terms of the frequency of extreme temperatures as measured by the Australian Actuaries Climate Index,” said Tim Andrews, who led the development of the index.
“The Bureau of Meteorology predicted this summer’s hot weather and reported it would be driven by a combination of the long-term increasing trend in global air and ocean temperatures, and the El Niño weather conditions.”
The climate index also showed clear evidence of the sustained rainfall that caused the 1-in-100-year flooding in North Queensland in February, as well as the continuing drought experienced in central NSW.
“The attribution of individual events to climate change is challenging to assess due to high levels of natural variability, but the Townsville event is consistent with expectations for rainfall intensity to increase,” Andrews said.
Andrews also noted that despite the heavy rainfall in north Australia, there were significant parts of NSW and Southern Queensland experiencing extremely dry conditions during the summer months.
The climate index, launched last year, tracks changes in the frequency of extreme high and low temperatures, heavy precipitation, dry days, strong wind, and changes in sea levels, to help businesses better assess how weather extremes translate into financial risk.

Tim Andrews, a Principal at Finity Consulting with 30-years of actuarial experience, collated the Climate Index, using data from Australia's Bureau of Meteorology’s (BOM) extensive network of weather stations and tide gauge facilities.

Links

• New climate index launched
• About the Australian Actuaries Climate Index
• Australian Actuaries Climate Index
• Australian Actuaries Climate Index shows Summer of record extremes: temperatures, rainfall, drought
• Climate index shows increasing frequency of hot days in Australia
• Climate Risk Disclosure – financial institutions feel the heat
• The Impact of Climate Change on Insurance against Catastrophes
• Climate Risk Management for Financial Institutions
• Can actuaries really afford to ignore climate change?