(UK) How Grassroots Schemes Across UK Are Tackling Climate Crisis

The Guardian - Matthew Taylor

Thinktank calls for more support for local initiatives ranging from heating to flood schemes

Ambition Lawrence Weston’s solar farm. Photograph: Bristol Energy Cooperative/Youtube

Communities across the UK are tackling the climate crisis with hundreds of local schemes ranging from neighbourhood heating to food co-ops, community land ownership projects and flood defences, according to a report.

A study from the IPPR thinktank found that community projects, often set up with the primary aim of reducing poverty and improving people’s day-to-day lives, were also reducing emissions and restoring nature.

Luke Murphy, the lead author of the report, said: “Under the radar there are already flourishing and transformative community initiatives to pool resources and create shared low-carbon energy, housing and natural assets … These groups have shown that they can increase community wealth and create thriving places while addressing the climate crisis.”

The report identifies hundreds of initiatives, including:

• Social housing schemes such as the Goodwin development in Hull, which has renovated 60 abandoned houses to create affordable family eco homes that require little or no energy to heat or cool. The community has also brought a water recycling system into collective ownership, and the trust is developing 40 more social homes.
  
  
• Reclaiming derelict land such as the Malls Mire woods on the south side of Glasgow, which was plagued by litter and fly-tipping. It has now been transformed into a thriving woodland and community gardens to grow vegetables and fruit, and hosts school clubs and holiday programmes.
  
  
• Repair cafes that are popping up around the country. In Derbyshire alone there are 16 that offer a free meeting space, tools and materials to help people make repairs to clothes, furniture and electrical appliances, reducing their consumption of new products and therefore their emissions.
  
  
• Renewable energy projects such as the Ambition Lawrence Weston community group, based in an area of Bristol with high levels of fuel poverty. It is establishing community-owned renewable energy projects, with a solar farm and plans for a giant wind turbine that, once complete, will power 3,850 homes, saving 1,965 tonnes of CO₂ and return a profit to the community of between £50,000 and £400,000 a year.

Mark Pepper, the development manager of Ambition Lawrence Weston, said that although many people in the area would “not put climate change at the top of the list”, the group had realised it could meet the community’s needs “while simultaneously adding climate value through … energy-efficient new homes, sustainable public transport or setting up our own community-owned wind turbine”.

He said: “These are things our residents benefit from, while also ensuring a positive climate impact at the same time. Putting our community’s needs first empowers local people to engage and take action on climate change, rather than feeling like they’re being told what’s best for them.”

The report found that because many of these schemes were not being properly assessed and measured little was known about their collective environmental impact – which the authors say is likely to have been underestimated by policy makers for years.

IPPR is calling for widespread devolution to support and fund similar schemes, and says a third of new onshore green energy should be community-owned “to share benefits of net zero transition”.

It wants new legislation to make it easier for communities to set up, run, own and reap the benefits of these new “climate commons”, which should be supported through a new “thriving places” fund.

“These groups have shown that they can increase community wealth and create thriving places while addressing the climate crisis,” said Murphy. “Now the government needs to act to enable all communities to have meaningful control of how their area adapts and benefits from the transition to net zero.”

Links

• Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR)
• Eco-homes become hot property in UK's zero-carbon ‘paradigm shift’ 
• Schemes boosting cycling and walking accelerate across the UK
• UK citizens' climate assembly to meet for first time
• COP25 climate summit: put children at heart of tackling crisis, says UN
• Tackling degraded oceans could mitigate climate crisis - report
• UK to host crucial global talks on tackling climate emergency
• Climate crisis seriously damaging human health, report finds

(AU) More Than 100 Australian Faith Groups Have Teamed Up To Demand Greater Action On Climate Change

SBS - Jarni Blakkarly

A protest outside Prime Minister Scott Morrison's electoral office on Thursday. Source: Supplied.

Faith leaders around the country have held protests urging the Morrison government to commit to more action on climate change, as part of a global movement.

Faith leaders across Australia have held a day of protest for more government action on climate change.

A group of a dozen people sat in meditation outside New South Wales Parliament house in Sydney on Thursday morning, as part of a silent protest calling on the Morrison government to submit higher emissions reduction targets.

Director of the Buddhist Council of NSW Gawaine Powell Davies said that while some protests are loud, others "draw attention by being very quiet”.

“What we are wanting to do is lend the voices of faith to demands that governments and others move quickly on the climate catastrophe before it’s too late,” he said.

“As a Buddhist, I have a strong sense that we are connected to all of creation and that we need to have a care for everything, and if we don’t we will all suffer."

A protest outside a church in Melbourne. Supplied.

The event was one of over 100 protests that took place around Australia on Thursday morning at religious locations and offices of senior federal politicians. 

It was part of a multi-faith climate justice event called ‘Sacred People, Sacred Earth’ coinciding with faith events around the world.

In Australian capital cities, church bells cities rang their bells, Islamic calls to prayer rang out and Jewish Rabbi’s blew the Shofar horn.

One of the key demands of the movement is that Australia sets a target to reach net zero emissions by 2030.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison has previously said that our goal is "to reach net zero emissions as soon as possible, and preferably by 2050".

However, he has declined to formally set the target, unlike other nations like the United Kingdom and Japan.

In a statement to SBS News a spokesperson for Minister for Energy and Emissions Reduction Angus Taylor said Australia was on track to meet and beat its 2030 Emission Reduction Target.

“Our emissions have fallen faster than many other countries, and significantly faster than the OECD or G20 averages,” they said.

“This is thanks to the Morrison Government’s real and practical action to reduce emissions while maintaining a strong economy.

“Action and outcomes are what matter, and our track record is one that all Australians can be proud of."

Links

• Roles of religion and ethics in addressing climate change
• Australian Religious Response to Climate Change
• Morality of Climate Change
• Catholics on Climate Change
• What do the world's religions have to say about sustainability?
• Religion and Climate Change | Council on Foreign Relations
• Climate change 'the biggest security threat ever faced by modern humans', David Attenborough warns

(AU) Outcry At Australia's Coal Plant Closures Misses The Point: Change Is Coming

The Guardian - Adam Morton

Trying to heavy owners won’t hold back the renewables tide. It’s time to plan, and the blueprint exists

‘With so much solar energy in the middle of the day, coal plants are barely making money, and Yallourn has been hit harder than most.’ Photograph: Bloomberg/Bloomberg via Getty Images

Author Adam Morton is Guardian Australia’s environment editor

If ever there is a case where the headline doesn’t tell the full story it is the news that Victoria’s Yallourn power generator – one of Australia’s oldest and dirtiest coal plants – will shut earlier than planned. 

The basic facts are clear: the owner, EnergyAustralia, had previously said the Latrobe Valley generator would close in 2032, and now it will be gone by 2028.

Despite the seven-year-notice period, much of the initial reaction to the announcement focused on fears of electricity price hikes and blackouts at a distant future date.

To some extent, it masked what had really happened. In reality, EnergyAustralia had made a deal with the Victorian government to keep the plant open longer than it almost certainly otherwise would have been.

Analysts have long expected Yallourn to shut early partly because it keeps breaking down, and partly because it is too inflexible to compete with the extraordinary influx of cheap renewable energy into the grid.

With so much solar energy being generated in the middle of the day, wholesale electricity prices in Victoria have dropped 70% over the past year. This has been good for consumers and the climate, but bad for coal plant owners, who are struggling to stay viable. Yallourn has been hit harder than most.

Modelling for the Australian Energy Market Operator (Aemo) that assumed a slower grid transformation that that now underway had previously suggested the plant could close by about 2026. Some workers at Yallourn expected it to shut even earlier, and were relieved on Wednesday to learn they might get seven years work before it goes.

EnergyAustralia linked its closure announcement to the global push to address the climate crisis, noting investors were moving away from thermal coal, and stressed shutting Yallourn would immediately cut the company’s emissions by 60%.

But the company was open to sweating the plant a little longer when it approached the Victorian government to make a deal on the closure. The government says it will not release details of the agreement, citing commercial confidentiality, but it doesn’t deny there may be public support to ensure it remains available until that date.

Victorian taxpayers could reasonably ask what they are spending to keep a 50-year-old plant online, and why the Andrews government thinks it will be needed that long.

The Morrison government’s response included raising concerns about what a closure in seven years would mean for grid reliability and energy affordability, urging the industry to build some form of replacement and leaving open the possibility it would step in if the private sector didn’t.

It was a less aggressive echo of the Coalition’s response when AGL announced it would shut the Liddell coal plant in NSW by 2023. Then, the government pressured the owner to extend its life before warning the taxpayer-funded Snowy Hydro may build a gas-fired generator if energy companies were too slow to commit.

The near repeat performance prompted some in the electricity industry to wonder: is this what substitutes for energy policy now?

Based on estimates put forward by plant owners, eight coal plants are due to shut over the next 20 years. Most experts believe that will prove a conservative timeline given the pace at which solar energy is pushing coal out.

A recent analysis found up to five plants including Yallourn could be unviable within the next four years. Dylan McConnell, from the University of Melbourne’s Climate and Energy College, has suggested we just bring the expected closure date of every coal plant forward by half a decade.

Energy policy in Australia is rife with contradictions. State governments are increasingly backing renewable energy and, in NSW, long-duration energy storage through underwriting and price guarantees. It is starting to drive the sort of transformation in electricity, if not the rest of the economy, that climate scientists warn must happen more quickly across the globe. But few in power publicly acknowledge coal closures could come in a rush.

Rather than introducing policy to accelerate the inevitable shift, the Morrison government criticises the state plans and rejects calls for a national policy framework that would guide private investment in the flexible energy needed to fill the gaps around a system that the energy security board says could be 60% solar and wind by the end of the decade.

The Coalition, of course, abolished a national carbon price in 2014 and spent the years following fighting itself over a series of failed potential replacements, losing a prime minister along the way. Scott Morrison has gone to great lengths to avoid re-opening an internal battle over energy, including promising to pay for a feasibility study into a new coal plant in central Queensland to placate local MPs and Senators.

It is the same split that has stopped the government from at least giving lip service to a target of reaching net zero emissions, a goal backed by more than 100 countries.

The energy solution devised by the energy minister, Angus Taylor, is an ad hoc mix of policies that include promising, but so far failing, to change the Clean Energy Finance Corporation so he can direct it to underwrite “grid reliability” projects, such as new gas and pumped hydro plants.

Federal and state governments are funding new grid connections between the states. And there has been an initial wave of announcements of privately backed grid-scale battery announcements.

But there is no overarching plan to to ensure a smooth transition if there is a run of coal closures. Business leaders and the energy security board have warned the private sector is less likely to build the new back-up capacity needed when governments are interfering in the market.

Amid all this, there is a model for what a transformed electricity system will need. Aemo last year released a blueprint for an optimal grid that found renewable energy could at times reach 90% within 15 years, and between six and 19 gigawatts of new flexible energy capacity should be in place by 2040 to support it.

This could come from batteries, pumped hydro, demand management programs and gas, but Aemo suggests new gas power – favoured by the Morrison government, and the only fossil fuel on the list – is likely to be more expensive than other options.

The market operator describes the blueprint as an “actionable roadmap” that prioritises the public. It might be worth dusting off and re-considering before anyone expresses concern about the next announcement of an early coal exit.

Links

• Yallourn, one of Australia's last brown coal power stations, to close early in favour of giant battery
• Australia needs to cut emissions by at least 50% by 2030 to meet Paris goals, experts say
• Australian farmers call for renewable energy zones as Nationals push coal and nuclear
• Renewable energy could render five of Australia’s remaining coal plants unviable by 2025
• Yallourn, one of Australia's last brown coal power stations, to close early in favour of giant battery
• EnergyAustralia to close Yallourn coal plant in 2028, to build massive big battery
• Renewable energy could render five of Australia’s remaining coal plants unviable by 2025
• Scott Morrison’s ‘gas-led recovery’: what is it and will it really make energy cheaper?
• We have 12 years to limit climate change catastrophe, warns UN
• Federal Coalition MPs raise fresh concerns about NSW clean energy commitment
• Australia kills off carbon tax
• Energy prices: large users could be paid to reduce demand at peak times

Sinking Land And Rising Seas: The Dual Crises Facing Coastal Communities

National Geographic - Madeleine Stone

A double whammy of climate change and human-caused land subsidence means global coastal residents are experiencing extreme sea-level rise.

The Jakarta Bay seawall protects shops, homes, and mosques from being inundated by the sea. Due to rising sea levels and the overextraction of groundwater, the capital is considered one of the world's fastest sinking cities. Photograph by Ian Teh, Panos Pictures/Redux

The world’s coastal residents are experiencing more extreme sea level rise than is widely appreciated because they are concentrated in places where the land is sinking rapidly, a study published Monday in Nature Climate Change has found.

Sea levels are rising globally as Earth’s ice sheets melt and as warming sea water expands. But on a local scale, subsidence, or sinking land, can dramatically aggravate the problem. Cities like New Orleans and Jakarta are experiencing very rapid sea level rise relative to their coastlines—the land itself is sinking as the water is rising.

Now, an international team of researchers has demonstrated that this one-two punch is more than a local problem. Sinking land makes coastal residents around the world disproportionately vulnerable to rising seas: The typical coastal inhabitant is experiencing a sea level rise rate three to four times higher than the global average.

“We are talking about not a forecast; we are saying this is happening today,” says lead study author Robert Nicholls of the University of East Anglia’s Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research. “And it’s quite significant.”

The silver lining, such as it is: Where coastal land is sinking, it’s in large part because of human activities, like groundwater withdrawal, that coastal cities can do something about.

From a local to a global problem

Some of the factors contributing to the fall (or rise) of Earth’s coastlines are beyond human control. Parts of Earth are still adjusting to the disappearance of glaciers that blanketed it during the last ice age, springing up in some places and sinking in others.

In coastal river deltas, land subsides slowly as freshly deposited sediments are compacted.

But in addition to those natural processes, human activities, including groundwater withdrawal, oil and gas extraction, sand mining, and the construction of flood barriers around rivers, can all cause the ground to sink.

Preventing river flooding, a good thing in itself, also stops rivers from spreading sediments that slowly rebuild the land.

In places where people are concentrated, these activities, particularly groundwater removal, often cause the land to subside much more quickly than it would via geological processes alone: Over the 20th century, parts of Jakarta, New Orleans, Shanghai, and Bangkok sank between six and 10 feet.

The problem of subsidence and its effects on sea level rise—where the land sinks, the oceans rise relative to the shore by the same amount—is well documented for certain cities. But prior to the new study the effect hadn’t been assessed at a global scale.

“We wanted to actually understand what is the human experience of relative sea level rise” by taking subsidence into account worldwide, Nicholls says.            

To estimate the rate of sea level rise experienced along thousands of sections of coastline worldwide, Nicholls and his colleagues compiled data from four key sources: satellite observations of climate change-fueled sea level rise; model estimates of how land is adjusting from the last ice age; data on natural subsidence in 117 river deltas, and estimates of human-caused subsidence in 138 large coastal cities.

The findings were dramatic. Satellite measurements put climate-driven sea level rise at about 3.3 millimeters per year (around an eighth of an inch).

Nicholls and his colleagues found that on average, Earth’s coastlines actually experienced a slightly lower relative lift of about 2.6 millimeters per year (0.1 inch) between 1993 and 2015, because so much land is still rising due to glacial rebound.

But that’s not where the majority of people live: Over the same time period, Earth’s coastal inhabitants saw the seas rise by an average of 7.8 to 9 millimeters annually (about half an inch).

This, the authors say, reflects the fact that coastal inhabitants are concentrated in rapidly subsiding areas, including sinking deltas and sinking coastal cities.

The problem is especially acute in southeast Asia, where in 2015, 185 million people lived in coastal floodplains—around 75 percent of the global total. Such people live with the threats of both river flooding and sea level rise.

If subsidence continues at current rates, far more coastal residents could be at risk in the next few decades.

Projected population growth alone will cause the number of people living in coastal floodplains to rise from 249 million in 2015 to 280 million in 2050, the study found.

Climate change-driven sea level rise will place another 25 to 30 million people in that flood zone; ongoing city subsidence adds 25 to 40 million more people on top of that.

University of Miami sea level rise expert Harold Wanless warns that it might not be accurate to suppose that today’s high rates of city subsidence will continue into the middle of the century.

“Shanghai, for example, has been trying for some time to limit theirs,” Wanless writes in an email. “And rising sea level over the next 30 years will force abandonment of portions of these low-lying cities.”

A key climate adaptation strategy

Indeed, a key implication of the study is that coastal cities around the world should be taking immediate steps to limit subsidence, before the combined effects of sinking land and rising seas force residents to retreat inland.

For many cities, Nicholls says that the “fundamental problem” is groundwater extraction, which causes the sediments in aquifers to compact together and the land above to sink.

That was the situation in Shanghai, where land subsidence was first recognized as a problem in the 1920s and has been mitigated greatly in recent decades through better groundwater management.

The same is true for Tokyo, where parts of the city sank more than 13 feet during the 20th century due to rapid groundwater depletion. Today, the city has all but eliminated subsidence through strict water-pumping regulations.

In other places, like coastal Louisiana’s fast-sinking Mississippi River Delta, undoing some of the damage caused by historic flood control measures will be key to reducing subsidence. There, a multibillion-dollar plan is underway to help restore the natural cycle of wetland growth by punching holes in the river’s 20th-century levee system. That would allow sediments to spill over into nearby marshes once again.

“Every locality needs to understand its situation,” says University of Florida oceanographer and coastal engineer Arnoldo Valle-Levinson, who wasn’t involved with the new paper. Valle-Levinson says the study offers “a nice way of reminding coastal municipalities that it’s not only climate-induced sea level rise that they should pay attention to.” Ultimately, he says, adaptation strategies will have to be tailored to local challenges.

Nicholls agrees that understanding and addressing the local causes of subsidence is essential. But he hopes that by framing sinking coastal real estate as a global issue, the new paper will encourage knowledge sharing between regions that have developed successful mitigation strategies, as well as more consideration of the issue by climate policymakers.

“You can think of subsidence mitigation just like climate mitigation,” Nicholls says. “It’s not ‘do one or the other’—it’s ‘do both.’”

Links

• A global analysis of subsidence, relative sea-level change and coastal flood exposure
• (NZ) When Climate Change And Other Emergencies Threaten Where We Live, How Will We Manage Our Retreat?
• Sea Level Data Confirms Climate Modeling Projections Were Right
• Melting Glaciers, Rising Seas: Approaching Climate Tipping Points
• Study Shows Sea Level Will Rise More And Faster Than Previously Believed
• (AU) Victoria Gets Trillion-Dollar Bad News: Sea Level Rises Will Swamp Parts Of The State
• (AU) Rising Sea Levels Visibly Transforming Parts Of Coastal Region Around Kakadu National Park
• Sea-Level Rise From Climate Change Could Exceed The High-End Projections, Scientists Warn
• New way to measure Antarctic snowfall helps predict the ice sheet’s survival
• Planting trees helps fight climate change—but we need billions more seedlings
• Rivers and lakes are the most degraded ecosystems in the world. Can we save them?

(AU) Australian Exporters Could Face Millions Of Dollars In European Tariffs As EU Seeks To Punish Polluters

ABC News - Linton Besser

A session of the European Parliament in Brussels voted that certain exporters will face millions of dollars in new tariffs over their climate policies. (Reuters: Francisco Seco)
  

Key Points The European Parliament has voted to introduce a carbon levy on imports into the EU from countries with weaker emission rules Australian importers could face a carbon levy of up to $77 per tonne under the new scheme The EU and Australia are currently negotiating a multibillion-dollar free trade agreement

LONDON - Australian exporters to Europe are likely to face millions of dollars in new tariffs after the European Parliament voted overnight to move forward with a carbon levy on products from countries lacking serious pollution reduction programs.

The vote came after a top parliamentary committee noted concerns about "the lack of cooperation by some of the EU’s trade partners … to reach the objectives of the Paris Agreement".

Canberra's diplomatic and trade representatives are in the midst of negotiating a multibillion-dollar free trade deal with the European Union.

But MEPs in Brussels are warning they will not ratify any such deal with Australia until it does more to reduce its emissions.

"Australia has to understand that we are really serious," Pascal Canfin, chairman of the parliament's environment committee, told the ABC.

A member of Emmanuel Macron’s centrist party, Mr Canfin said compliance with the Paris Agreement on climate change mitigation was non-negotiable.

"We will not ratify a trade deal if there is no concrete additional climate action from Australia," he said.

Kathleen van Brempt, a key parliamentary trade coordinator, said an FTA was contingent on "a clear vision [from] Australia by when and how they will become climate neutral and by when and how they will phase out of coal".

Until Australia establishes a new scheme to lower emissions, its exporters to Europe face the prospect of paying additional tariffs under the new Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM), which is expected to come into force in 2023.

The mechanism is designed to apply tariffs on imports equivalent to the fees paid under the EU's Emissions Trading System by local businesses producing the same product.

"It makes sure that we have … a level playing field between the domestic production and production of products that are coming into Europe," Ms van Brempt said.

In 2016, Australia exported goods to Europe worth more than $20 billion.

The European Parliament says it will not ratify a free trade agreement with Australia until it does more to reduce emissions. (ABC Gippsland: Jarrod Whittaker)

Europe's ETS was introduced in 2005, and now Brussels is rolling out a suite of new climate reforms aimed at cutting Europe's CO2 emissions by 55 per cent by the end of the decade.

On Wednesday afternoon in Brussels, the parliament adopted a resolution outlining its expectations for the CBAM, the details of which are scheduled to be set out by the European Commission in June.

Once the Commission unveils the detailed policy, further parliamentary ratification is required to make the carbon tariffs into law.

The program is expected to begin by targeting a narrow range of industrial sectors including steel, cement and chemicals.

'Australia today is a free rider'

In the past decade, Australia has exported to Europe more than 980,000 tonnes of steel.

At the price of €50 ($77) per tonne of carbon — Brussels' own forecast — exports of the same volume would attract tariffs equivalent to $77 million.

It's expected that Australian steel exports will be hit with tariffs, as well as cement and chemicals. (Supplied: Nathan River Resources)

Ms van Brempt said the carbon tariffs were vital to protect European industry from so-called "free-riders".

"In Europe we consider Australia … is not really very loyal in implementing the Paris agreement," she told the ABC.

"Australia today is a free rider … it continues to make their products based on fossil fuels."

But Europe's ETS has been far from a raging success.

Thanks to extensive lobbying, its carbon price has stayed relatively low, and millions of dollars' worth of pollution permits have been granted for free to heavy industries to cushion them from outside competition.

"The European carbon market has not played its full potential because of the free allowances," Mr Canfin said.

He pledged the program was heading in the right direction, that the carbon price would climb beyond €50 ($77) a tonne and that "we are going to reduce the free allowances".

The new border tariffs would effectively replace them, he said: "Of course we are not going to provide our industries both CBAM … plus free allowances".

"The phasing in of CBAM will go hand in hand with the phasing out of the free allowances."

On Tuesday that pledge looked shaky, after an amendment to the CBAM proposal, which sought to eliminate all free carbon emission allowances, was voted down.

Charles de Lusignan, from the European Steel Association, said the industry only supported the introduction of carbon tariffs "as a supplementary mechanism", and expected that industry would continue to be able to claim pollution allowances to defray other expenses, such as the high costs ofcarbon abatement technology.

An EU employers group, BusinessEurope, said free allowances must continue until CBAM had "proven its effectiveness".

Links

• European Parliament: Carbon levy on EU imports needed to raise global climate ambition
• Australia out of the ‘climate club’ as EU advances carbon border tax
• Big-emitting Australian businesses could soon face costly carbon levy in Europe
• Carbon border levy should be in place no later than 2023, EU lawmakers say
• Australian exporters could face $140 per tonne carbon tax, thanks to weak Morrison targets
• Why the EU’s proposed carbon border levy is an important test for global action on climate change

(AU) Certain Suburbs Being Left To Swelter Under Higher Temperatures Due To Lack Of Vegetation

NEWS.com.au - Charis Chang

Temperatures are expected to hit terrifying highs in the suburbs – but the oppressive heat could be mitigated with a simple solution.

A heatwave in Australia in November 2020. Scientists are predicting the temperature will continue to rise due to global warming. Source: Supplied

Certain suburbs in Australia’s major cities are being left to swelter under higher temperatures – which could be reduced through one simple measure.

Monash University researchers have released a report today commissioned by the Australian Conservation Foundation that says Australia’s major cities need more trees and vegetation to reduce serious heatwave impacts.

The report notes there can be a “heat gap” or large differences in temperature between suburbs due to the amount of vegetation and built infrastructure.

For example, temperatures in the Sydney council area of Blacktown, which only has 22 per cent vegetation cover, are 5.8C higher due to extra heat from its built infrastructure.


A new report from CSIRO and BOM has warned us about the worsening effects of climate change.

This compares to Mosman, which has a moderately high level of vegetation (43 per cent) and which only experiences an extra 2.2C in temperature from its built environment.

The report says the variation between different areas of Sydney, is much higher than in Melbourne and Brisbane.

Experts say temperatures are forecast to soar during summer thanks to climate change, with hot summer days in Melbourne and Brisbane expected to regularly top 40C by 2060-2080, and up to 50C in Sydney.

Cities in particular will feel the brunt of increasing heatwaves thanks to a phenomenon known as the urban heat island effect (UHI).

The microclimate around cities is generally warmer due to a number of factors, including that high rise buildings and narrow streets create canyons where heat gets trapped.

Materials such as concrete, asphalt, steel and glass also retain more heat than natural materials, and a lower proportion of tree cover or vegetation means there is less moisture to cool the air or to create shade.

Blacktown experiences higher temperatures thanks to a lack of vegetation. Source: News Corp Australia

Mosman is a lot leafier, which helps keep temperatures down. Source: News Corp Australia

Areas where there are more people also tend to be warmer because of heat waste from the increased use of things like cars, factories and cooling systems.

“When temperatures go up, we strive to make ourselves more comfortable and rely on more airconditioning and refrigeration. This increases electricity usage and creates more waste heat, further contributing to the UHI effect,” the report states.

There are several ways to reduce the UHI effect including the use of reflective or super-cool materials, devices for solar control and shading, natural temperature sinks, or cooling systems that involve evaporation and transpiration.

However, one simple and cost-effective method is increasing the amount of trees, shrubs and even grass. These plants will help absorb sunlight, release water vapour that evaporates and cools the air, and provide shading.

This could be achieved through creating more open space, parks, wetlands, vertical greenery on building facades and vegetated roofs.

Sadly, the amount of vegetation has declined in all major cities except for Hobart, which is the only capital city to have more tree cover in 2020 than it did in 2013.

In Sydney, there was a 0.8 per cent decline in vegetation cover during this period, and while this may seem small, it is equal to 12.2sq km – or about 570 AFL football fields.

Sydney may be considered one of the most beautiful cities in the world but it’s slowly losing its vegetation. Source: Supplied

“Heatwaves kill more Australians than any other natural disaster and these will get more severe as our climate continues to change,” report co-author Dr Lucy Richardson of Monash University said.

“Our research shows increasing urban vegetation will become essential for our three largest cities – Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane – to reduce serious heatwave impacts by 2060-2080.

“Natural infrastructure takes time to establish to its maximum effectiveness, so acting early is critical for meeting future needs.”

ACF campaigns director Paul Sinclair said Australia’s national environmental law had not been effective in preventing the destruction of native trees.

“In the first 17 years that Australia had a national environment law, 20,212 hectares of urban threatened species habitat – that’s 11,400 MCG footy grounds – was destroyed,” he said.

“Decisions made by Australian governments in the coming months will either lock in permanent and escalating damage to the ecological systems that sustain human health and livelihoods, or they will promote a healthier, fairer and greener world.”

The Monash research is the first study to examine the cumulative effects of future climate change and the UHI effect at local government level across Australia’s three largest cities.

SYDNEY

It may come as a surprise but this city, considered one of the most beautiful in the world, is one of Australia’s least green capitals.

It has an overall 34 per cent vegetation cover and experiences an extra 5.5C in hotter temperatures due to heat trapped by the city’s infrastructure.

The extra heat in some areas can reach as high as 13.5C.

Increasing tree cover will provide shade and cool temperatures. Source: News Corp Australia

Improving the city’s vegetation cover is especially important as the hottest summer days are expected to increase to between 41.7C and 50C for 2060-2080 under a business-as-usual scenario.

In comparison, the summer’s hottest days over the last 50 years at Sydney’s Observatory Hill station averaged 39.1°C.

Sydney can expect around 56 of its average days to reach over 30C each year by 2060–2080, with around 15 average days over 35C and two average days over 40C.

Mosman and North Sydney are expected to have the highest predicted temperature peak, at 50C. The lowest peak was expected to be Burwood at 47.9C.

However, when looking at average temperatures, Blacktown was expected to have the highest mean summer temperature of 31.3C.

BRISBANE

Brisbane is one of Australia’s greenest capital cities with 54 per cent overall vegetation cover.

On average the city experiences an extra 1C temperature due to heat being trapped by the city’s built infrastructure.

However, this can be as high as 6.1C extra in some areas.

Predictions suggest the city’s hottest summer days will sit between 38.3C and 41.8C by 2060–2080, under a business-as-usual scenario.

In comparison, summer’s hottest days over the last 50 years at the Brisbane Airport station averaged 35°C.

There will be around 137 average days over 30C each year and around 14 average days over 35C each year.

This is considerably hotter than the long-term average of 30C and the average for the 2019–2020 summer, which was 30.9C.

Brisbane is one of the greenest cities in Australia. Picture: Richard Walker Source: News Corp Australia

MELBOURNE

Melbourne is one of Australia’s least green capital cities with 23 per cent overall vegetation cover.

The city’s temperatures are typically 5.5C higher due to heat being trapped by the city’s built infrastructure.

This can climb to as much as 13.5C of extra heat in some areas.

Predictions suggest the city’s hottest summer days will sit between 42.9C and 49.4C by 2060-2080, under a business-as-usual scenario.

Casey would have the coolest maximum hottest summer days at 47C, compared with the highest hottest days predicted for Maribyrnong and Brimbank, both reaching 49.4C.

At the moment, summer’s hottest days over the last 50 years at Melbourne’s Olympic Park station averaged 41.9C.

Melbourne should expect around 48 average days to reach over 30C each year, with 17 average days over 35C and three average days over 40C.

Melbourne is one of the least green cities in Australia. Picture: Tony Gough Source: News Corp Australia

Links

• Australians face a hotter future if our cities don't do more to cool 'heat islands', report finds
• Natural solutions needed for our overheating cities
• Bureau of Meteorology: Climate Data Online
• Planning Institute of Australia: Planning in a Changing Climate (pdf)
• Australian Conservation Foundation: Solutions for a hot city
• CSIRO: Track to the future: climate change and your city
• United Nations: Urban Climate Action Is Crucial to Bend the Emissions Curve
• Cities could get more than 4°C hotter by 2100. To keep cool in Australia, we urgently need a national planning policy
• Troubling detail in Aussie weather data
• The climate detail worrying scientists
• What 2C of warming actually looks like

(AU) The Single Most Important Resource Underpinning Australia’s Food Security Is Under Threat

Sydney Morning Herald - Angus Houston

Author Sir Angus Houston is the chair of the Murray-Darling Basin Authority.

I’ve spent the past six months out in the Murray-Darling Basin, listening and learning. During my latest trip – to central and northern NSW – I was struck deeply by the great uncertainty many people are feeling about the future after experiencing the hottest and driest three years on record. 

At the iconic internationally recognised Macquarie Marshes I saw firsthand how dryland vegetation has encroached upon the marshes – a small but significant sign (no doubt replicated in other parts of Australia) that illustrates that our drier and hotter climate is quickly changing our landscapes, communities and industries.

The Darling River at Louth, in far west NSW, in February last year. Credit: Jenny Evans/Getty Images

While the grass may be a little greener now, it temporarily masks a growing genuine concern about the future. What will the next season hold, and the one after that? What does that mean for the younger generations the future of these communities which people quite rightly feel a responsibility to protect. I have seen firsthand how climate and water shortages are a significant threat to the security of our communities.

Climate change acts as a threat-multiplier. More frequent droughts and natural disasters increase pressure on resources, communities, institutions and infrastructure. It can exacerbate existing vulnerabilities within societies, and have a destabilising effect, worsening the factors that generate conflict and social unrest.

Even stable and wealthy nations like ours are exposed. Only 18 months ago, communities in the northern basin were carting drinking water because dams had run dry.


US President Joe Biden signed a raft of executive actions to combat climate change, including pausing new oil and gas leases on federal land and cutting fossil fuel subsidies, as he pursues clean energy policies he billed as a boon to the economy.

Our prosperity and way of life are dependent on our nation’s water and food security. And the Murray-Darling Basin is the single most important resource underpinning this security.

Last year – through the 2020 Basin Plan Evaluation – we shared a range of future climate scenarios the basin could face developed by the CSIRO. The most probable scenario is that average annual streamflow in 30 years’ time will be up to 30 per cent less than what we see today, due to a 10 per cent reduction in rainfall. We released these climate scenarios alongside a commitment to support the basin in adapting to climate challenges and increasing resilience.

Adapting to a challenge of the magnitude of climate change can seem overwhelming, paralysing. But I believe that as a nation, Australia is strong enough and smart enough to rise to the challenge. Many are already doing just that.

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Australia faces ‘constellation’ of diplomatic pressures over climate.

There are plenty of conversations happening at kitchen tables and board room tables about this challenge and what communities and industries are already doing to adapt.

Whether you call it climate change, or just changing weather patterns, it’s clear that now more than ever we all have to lean in and learn – from other communities, industry groups or governments – so together we’re tackling this complex challenge of water scarcity and hotter temperatures from all angles.

The good news is that we have numerous leaders, industries and groups charging ahead with their adaptation efforts. They are rightly proud of the work they’re doing and the progress they’re making to adapt to a drier and hotter climate.

We are bringing together these leaders from agriculture, natural resource management, tourism, finance, support services and government as part of our Basin Climate Resilience Summit, which starts on Thursday in Canberra.

The MDBA does not have all the answers. Our role is to take a basin-wide view and do what we can to supercharge the climate adaptation efforts already underway. The summit is the beginning of this journey and poses three questions. What are the key focus areas we need to consider for the basin? What impediments or lessons do we need to navigate? What are the opportunities to collaborate, and if so how?

It’s hoped the summit will contribute to the collective preparedness of all in the basin. We will ensure all interested parties are kept informed as we continue to work together so our basin communities can survive and thrive sustainably.

Links

• (AU) Stop Fighting And Start Adapting To Climate Change, Basin Authority Says
• (AU) We Looked At 35 Years Of Rainfall And Learnt How Droughts Start In The Murray-Darling Basin
• (AU) The Mystery Of The Murray-Darling’s Vanishing Flows
• (AU) New FOI Ruling Orders Disclosure Of CSIRO Internal Documents On Its Response To Murray-Darling Criticisms
• (AU) Australia’s Water Is Vanishing
• (AU) 6,000 Years Of Climate History: An Ancient Lake In The Murray-Darling Has Yielded Its Secrets
• (AU) No Water, No Leadership: New Murray Darling Basin Report Reveals States’ Climate Gamble
• Murray-Darling Basin Inspector-General To Oversee Water Efficiency, Compliance And Allegations Of Theft
• Barwon-Darling River Faces 'Collapse' From Government Mistakes: Report
• How Taxpayers Are Funding A Huge Corporate Expansion In The Murray-Darling Basin
• Murray-Darling Report Shows Public Authorities Must Take Climate Change Risk Seriously