Tuesday, January 27, 2015

Hotter

Climate change will hit Australia harder than rest of world, study shows | Environment | The Guardian

The CSIRO/BOM website that the article links to looks pretty good - it breaks Australia down into regions and explains what is on the cards regarding not just rainfall, but extreme rainfall, temperatures, etc.  It also indicates the degree of confidence.

While regional forecasts of the effects of climate change are still very tricky, it's interesting to note that one thing they are still most confident about  is that the south west corner of Western Australia will continue to get drier. 

The Guardian report also notes this:
Some of the most profound transformations are set to take place in the
seas that surround Australia, which will warm by a further 2C to 4C
unless emissions are cut.
The ecological changes that this could involve have potentially serious consequences on such mundane matters as tourism.   This summer, a boy was stung at the Brisbane bayside suburb of Wellington Point by the (sometimes) deadly irukandji jellyfish.   An article at the Conversation in 2013 noted that they are normally only in northern Queensland waters (north of Gladstone) but had been found in Harvey Bay.  Now Brisbane.   While it remains unclear whether they can establish this far south in large numbers, if they did, and effectively prevented widespread use of southern Queensland beaches for the hottest summer months, the tourism effect would be very dire.

I am guessing that economists and their DICE models haven't worked out a way to factor that one into projections for GDP effect of global warming in 2090...

2 comments:

Not Trampis said...

you have been brainwashed. It is getting cooler. Ask Steve Kates

Anonymous said...

Good to see the CSIRO guys back from summer vacation.