Reef 2050 plan to restore outstanding universal values of the Great Barrier Reef decade by decade questioned in the wake of back to-back bleaching events

Time is running out for one of the seven wonders of the natural world. Two-thirds of the Great Barrier Reef is now severely damaged by bleaching. #sciencematters @NOAA @CoralCoE. pic.twitter.com/91GzreTe3c

— Australian Academy of Science (@Science_Academy) January 4, 2018

On 8 December 2017 the Australian Academy of Science made a submission to the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority consultation on the Coastal Ecosystems Position Statement.

This submission made the following points:

* The federal government Reef 2050 Long-term Sustainability Plan to restore the “Outstanding Universal Values” of the Great Barrier Reef decade by decade is no longer tenable following back to-back bleaching events.

* Climate change is a clear and present challenge to the ongoing health of the Great Barrier Reef.

* Almost all “historic” and “legacy” stressors to the Great Barrier Reef remain today, and most of them continue to escalate — for example, land clearing, maintenance dredging, ship anchoring, and coastal recreational fishing pressure.

* There is a need to avoid further environmental damage through better management of stressors.

* Monitoring of drivers or stressors, including so called “legacy” drivers, should be included as a subject of research and management.

Forecasting a dangerous present and devastating future for Australia

“Background warming associated with anthropogenic climate change has seen Australian annual mean temperature increase by approximately 1.1 °C since 1910. Most of this warming has occurred since 1950.” [Australian Bureau of Meteorology, Annual Climate Statement 2017]

Bloomberg, 10 January 2018:

The road-melting heatwave that made Sydney the hottest place on Earth at the weekend may just be a taste of things to come. 

Temperatures in Australia are set to rise until around 2050 due to greenhouse gas emissions already in the atmosphere, according to the country’s weather bureau. 

“Australia is one country where you really can see the signal of global warming,” Karl Braganza, the Bureau of Meteorology’s head of climate monitoring, told reporters on a call. “We’ve locked the degree of warming in until mid-century and that means it’s likely that one of the next strong El Nino events in the coming decade or two will set a new record.”

Western Sydney touched 47.3 degrees Celsius (117 degrees Fahrenheit) on Sunday and 2017 was Australia’s third-hottest year on record. Heat and drought risk devastating crops in Australia, the world’s third-largest exporter of cotton where farm production is forecast to be worth A$59 billion ($46 billion) this financial year.

The Heat is On

Australia has had just one cooler-than-average year since 2005

Since 2005, Australia has notched up seven of its 10 warmest years, the weather bureau said in its annual climate statement.

More heatwaves could stress a power grid that’s struggled to cope with demand as people crank up air-conditioning during the scorching summer months.

Australian Bureau of Meteorology Annual Climate Statement 2017, issued January 2018.

Visible impacts in 2018.................

The Guardian, 9 January 2018:

More than 400 animals have died in one colony alone as temperatures soar above 47C, causing exhaustion and dehydration

Mounds of dead flying foxes in Campbelltown suburb of Sydney, Australia. Photograph: Facebook/Help Save the Wildlife and Bushlands in Campbelltown

So where does Australia stand on climate change at the start of 2018?

On 21 December 2017 IPSOS Social Research Institute released its 2017 Climate Change Report which provides the findings the company’s annual climate change research.

It would appear that the Australian general public is not walking away from a belief that climate change is real, that it is affecting our lives and action on the part of government is required.

IPSOS, Climate Change Report 2017, excerpts:

Priorities of environmental action

Once again, renewable energy is the top environmental issue Australians would act on if they were in charge of decision-making. More than half (56%) identify renewable energy as an issue they would choose to address. The majority of Australians have identified renewable energy as an issue for action every year since surveying began in 2007.

Compared with 2016, there has been no movement in the top 6 issues of importance. Water and river Heath (49%) came in at number two. This is its highest rating for action since 2012 (when it was 52).

In third place in 2017 is illegal waste dumping (46%), followed by deforestation (45%), sustainability and climate change (both 43%).

In 2016 we noted that climate change had hit its highest rating since 2008 (when 47% believed it to be a top priority for action), and it retains that sixth place with more than two in five Australians once again identifying it as an issue for action.

Australians in regional areas are more likely to identify renewable energy as an issue for action compared with their counterparts in capital cities (62% ‘rest of Australia’ vs. 53% capital city residents). The same pattern is observed for water and river health (58% vs. 44%) and deforestation (51% vs. 42%).

The role of human activity in climate change

The past few years have seen a growing consensus in the political sphere that climate change is caused by human-driven processes. In the face of this change, Australians’ views of the causes of climate change have moved little in the past decade. This stasis has continued in 2017.

Only 3% of Australians think there is no such thing as climate change. Around one-in-ten (12%) believe climate change is caused entirely or mostly by natural processes. Two-in-five (42%) believe that human activity is mainly or entirely responsible for climate change and 38% believe that climate change is caused partly by humans and partly by natural processes.

Half of Australians aged under 50 years of age believe that climate change is mostly or entirely caused by human activity (50%) compared with one-third of those aged 50 and above (31%).

Voting intention, like age, is linked to public opinion on the role of human activity in climate change. Liberal voters and One Nation voters are less likely to think that climate change was mostly or entirely caused by human activity (34% and 25% respectively). Whereas, Labor voters and Greens voters are more likely to identify human activity as mostly or entirely causing climate change (50% and 69% respectively). There are no differences by geography, but those with a university degree are also more likely to say human activities are entirely or mainly responsible (51%).....

Climate change is a pressing issue with serious consequences

Most Australians think that climate change is already underway (62% either strongly or somewhat agree). More than half (54%) agree that it poses a serious threat to our way of life over the next 25 years. This increases to 64% agreement when considering the next 100 years…….

Who’s responsible for action on climate change, and who’s doing a good job?

….In 2017, Australians consider the international community to be performing best of the parties tested. More than one in five (22%) feel that the performance of the international community is very or fairly good (compared with 19% in 2016).

This means the international community overtakes State Governments in relation to perceived performance on climate change. In 2016, 20% said State Governments. This year, State Governments and the Federal Government sit in second place and 18% rated both these levels of government as very or fairly good. As in 2016, business and industry was considered the lowest performer (15% rated their performance as good).

Although business and industry is regarded as being the poorest performer of the groups tested, combined with such a low expectation of leading action on climate change, arguably this poor perception of performance is not as relevant as it is for the Federal Government (which carries the greatest weight of responsibility).

Liberal voters are far more complimentary about the current Federal Government’s performance on action on climate change (31% gave a good rating compared with 16% of Labor voters and 10% of Greens voters).

Who should be mainly responsible for action on climate change?

Participants were asked to rate the performance of the Federal Government, the international community, State Governments and business. It is apparent that Australians do not believe that any of these parties are performing particularly well on climate action.

Climate denialists discuss suing a company for NOT increasing pollution

There are times when one wonders just how crazy the people associated with The Heartland Institute can get – then this sentence pops up a 6-page email from the Institute’s CEO Jim Bast to its Director of Communications Jim Lakely:

sue a company for not increasing CO2 emissions, force a court to consider the evidence on CO2 benefits.

The October 2017 email exchange can be read at https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/4112082-Joe-Bast-Email.html

A list of people on The Heartland Institute’s mailing list who would be receiving such suggestions, courtesy of DeSmog Blog:

Heartland Institute's Climate Scientists Mailing List

Heartland Institute's Climate Economists Mailing List 

As far-right global warming denialists in the Turnbull Government tend to mimic US moves against science-based policy, I suspect that this pared-down version of the latest Heartland playlist will be used in Australia in 2018 whenever they plan strategy or are quoted in the media on the subject of climate change:

* be briefing news reporters and news readers

* simplify the issue by focusing on one or only a few arguments and images

* identify a few good spokespersons and focus on promoting them

* stop chasing the other side’s latest argument and focus instead on the benefits of CO2

* focus on the “tuning scandal” that discredits the models

* turn debate from referring to median temperatures to high temperatures, which show no trend

* find independent funding for [insert climate change denier of choice]

* respond to [insert climate report of choice]

* get good people onto EPA advisory boards

* we need to be able to say “EPA is reconsidering whether CO2 is a pollutant”

* document instances where EPA etc. fail to cite research findings that contradict their agenda

* conduct a new survey of scientists to refute the 97% consensus claims

* sue a company for not increasing CO2 emissions, force a court to consider the evidence on CO2 benefits

* read The Business of America is Lobbying to understand the tactics of those we are really up against

* never use the phrases “windmill farms,” “all of the above,” “carbon pollution,” “social cost of carbon,” or “air pollution”

* use “industrial windmills,” “reliable and affordable,” “carbon dioxide emissions,” “benefits and costs of fossil fuels,” and “air quality”

* emphasize that we are pro-science and pro-environment… and the other side is not

* always think about what is most important to your audience

* when being interviewed, deliver your headlines first, don’t let the reporter lead you astray or cut you off

* prepare to answer the “what if you are wrong?” question with “what if you are wrong? How much damage will you have caused by costing the average household $4,000 a year for nothing?”

* fundamentally challenge, reform, or replace the [insert government agency of choice], the source of much pseudoscience

* stop funding “more research”

* clearly distinguish “safe” – a policy concept – from “risk” – a scientific concept, and keep scientists from pontificating on the former and advocates from misrepresenting the latter

* doubling the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere would increase plant productivity by 35%.

* any SCC calculation that doesn’t include the benefits of CO2 should be rejected out of hand

Australia's greenhouse gas emission abatement record goes far beyond disheartening

In 1990 Australia’s greenhouse gas emissions were calculated at 547.7 million tonnes (Mt), CO₂ -equivalent (CO₂-e). This represented 32.1 tonnes CO₂-e per head of population.

In the following years emissions rose and fell in response to economic and environmental factors, so that in 2005 annual emissions totalled 584.2  Mt CO₂-e or 28.6 tonnes CO₂-e per head of population.

By 2007 these annual emissions had risen to 597.2 Mt CO₂-e. That was 28.3 tonnes CO₂-e  per head of population.  [Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS), 4613.0 - Australia's Environment: Issues and Trends, Jan 2010]  

In 2008 total greenhouse gas emissions were still climbing to reach 618.1 Mt CO₂-e.

Total greenhouse gas emissions were still high in 2009 with an annual total of 599.8 Mt CO₂ -e.

At the close of 2010 national emissions had fallen to 543 Mt CO₂–e for the year.

Then by the end of 2011 annual greenhouse gas emissions came to 546.3 Mt CO₂–e.

Annual emissions for the year to December 2012 were estimated to be 551.9 Mt CO2-e

In 2013 annual greenhouse gas emissions were estimated to be 538.4 Mt CO₂–e.

2014 saw annual emissions reach an estimated to be 535.9 Mt CO₂–e.

Come 2015 and annual greenhouse gas emissions totalled 529.2 Mt CO₂-e. This gives an estimated 21.1 tonnes CO₂-e per head of population. [Dept. of the Environment and Energy, Progress of the National Greenhouse Gas Inventory]

However, Australia’s Emissions Projections 2017 report released last December by the Turnbull Government states in part:

“Australia’s emissions have risen in the past three years. A major factor in this growth has been the rapid expansion of the LNG sector.”

“Total emissions in 2030 are projected to be 570 Mt CO₂-e.”

Back in 2015 the Australian Government promised to reduce annual greenhouse gas emissions to 26-28 per cent on 2005 levels by 2030. Based on ABS data that should equate to an estimated annual emissions level of 420.7 Mt CO₂-e to 432.4 Mt CO₂–e in 2030 or between 20.6 to 21.2 tonnes CO₂-e per head of population.

Instead the latest report is indicating that Australia’s emissions are expected to exceed not only the base line 1990 level but also the 2005 annual greenhouse gas emissions level, with per capita emissions remaining static at approximately the 2015 figure.

It appears that policy efforts of the last twenty-seven years have been for nought, because it looks for all the world as though Turnbull & Co have abandoned any pretence they care about genuine, effective emissions reduction.

If the current federal government and industry had to sit a climate change mitigation exam today they would likely receive an F for failure  from the examiners.

UPDATE

National Greenhouse Gas Inventory data for 2016-17 show that Australia's greenhouse gas emissions stood at 550.2 Mt CO₂–e as of September 2017, a 1.3% rise on the 2015-16 annual emissions total. The 2016-17 per capita estimate was 22.5 Mt CO₂–e per person.

Coal needs to be consigned to the scrap book says former executive director of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change

These issues get reported in mainstream media but are falling on the deaf ears of monumentally ignorant Turnbull Government minsters, senator and MPs.

ABC News, 27 November 2017:

The woman who led the world to a global climate change agreement has a message for Australia: "You really do have to see that we are at the Kodak moment for coal."

Christiana Figueres, until last year the executive director of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, doesn't mean happy snaps for the family album.

Rather, the decimation of the once dominant photographic company Kodak by digital change — in the same way that coal-fired power is being eclipsed by renewable energy.

She hopes to see coal, like those sentimental moments in time captured in photographs, confined to history — with the world remembering the contribution the fossil fuel has made to human development, while recognising the need to retire it as a fuel source because of its contribution to global warming.

And, she says, it's happening.

"The fact is that we are already seeing the decline of coal, we are seeing more and more countries phasing out of coal," Ms Figueres, who is based in London, told the ABC.

"We just had 25 countries come together [at the latest international climate change talks] in Bonn to say that they are moving out of coal in the short term.

"That does not include Australia or India or China, but you can begin to see the trend…..

Which makes arguments that India needs the coal from Adani's planned mega-mine in North Queensland — and the Federal Government's determination to see the mine ahead — baffling to Ms Figueres.

The Government's Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility, or NAIF, is considering Adani's request for a subsidised loan of up to $1 billion to help it build a railway to connect the Carmichael mine in outback Queensland to the Abbot Point Coal Mine near Mackay, which Adani also owns.

By law, the NAIF is not permitted to make loans for projects that would damage Australia's international reputation.

Earlier this month, Ms Figueres wrote to the NAIF arguing that providing such a loan for a project that would significantly add to greenhouse gas emissions would do just that.

"I wrote to NAIF because I am very concerned about the fact that NAIF could still be considering giving a concessional loan to the Adani Group to allow them to extract profitably from the Carmichael coal mine and transport that coal all the way to the Abbot Point Coal Terminal," Ms Figueres said.

"First of all, it has huge environmental impacts. The more coal we burn, the further away we are going to be from the targets established in the Paris agreement [to keep atmospheric temperature rises well below 2 degrees above pre-industrial levels].

"But also, the more coal we burn around the world, independently of where it is going to be burned, the more negatively we are affecting public health.

"Now we have this issue of the Carmichael coal mine which, if it goes ahead, would frankly blow completely out of the water any emissions reductions that Australia has committed to.

Is the NSW Berejiklian Coalition Government taking the Norther Rivers bushfire risk level seriously?

The NSW Nationals Parks and Wildlife Service (NPWS) manages more than 870 national parks and reserves totalling over 7 million hectares.

With 22 per cent of the Clarence Valley covered by heavily timbered national parks and the entire NSW Northern Rivers region having 10 national parks, at least 9 nature reserves and 2 state forests, the risk of bushfires has always been high.

With climate change raising the fire risk and the NSW Berejiklian Coalition Government stripping the NWPS of personnel and funding, many local residents are beginning to worry.

Sacked former Australian prime minister Tony Abbott was in London this month and 'Daring to Doubt'

"Primitive people once killed goats to appease the volcano gods, we are more sophisticated now but are still sacrificing our industries and our living standards to the climate gods to little more effect", Liberal MP for Warringah Tony Abbott, 9 October 2017

On 9 October 2017 a former Australian prime minister sacked by his party before he had completed one term in office was speaking at a Global Warming Policy Foundation event held at the Institution of Mechanical Engineers in London.

It appears that Tony Abbott made sure that no journalist from the Australian Broadcasting Commission was present to hear his anti-climate change lecture, “Daring to Doubt”.

One could understand his motive – after none of the venue rooms available can seat more than 210 persons.

Such a small number is hardly a good reason to sock Australian taxpayers for costs associated with this annual lecture – which on past behaviour he is highly likely to attempt.

In the last calendar year Abbott spent $29,444.13 on overseas travel as a backbencher without any additional parliamentary responsibility. He was reimbursed this money by the Dept. of Finance.

Readers should click on the link to the transcript of his ‘lecture’ and enjoy the irony of him of all people telling the British:

“In Australia, we’ve had ten years of disappointing government. It’s not just the churn of prime ministers that now rivals Italy’s, the internal divisions and the policy confusion that followed a quarter century of strong government under Bob Hawke and John Howard. It’s the institutional malaise. We have the world’s most powerful upper house: a Senate where good government can almost never secure a majority. Our businesses campaign for same sex marriage but not for economic reform. Our biggest company, BHP, the world’s premier miner, lives off the coal industry that it now wants to disown. And our oldest university, Sydney, now boasts that its mission is “unlearning”.”

In the face of the growing threat of climate change sometimes Australian politicians leave me speechless

The Guardian, 9 October 2017:

The New South Wales government will introduce legislation to approve an underground coalmine that was blocked by the courts because it was polluting Sydney’s drinking water.

On Monday the state’s energy minister, Don Harwin, announced the government would overturn a decision by the NSW court of appeal to block the extension of the Springvale colliery.

The mine, owned by Centennial Coal, is the sole supplier to Lithgow’s Mount Piper power station, which provides about 10% of NSW’s electricity.

On Monday Harwin said the mine was “vital for energy security and affordability”.

“My top priority as energy minister is to ensure NSW households and business have an affordable, secure and reliable energy supply – this decision supports that,” he said.

The legislation, which is expected to be introduced to the parliament this week, will change the NSW Environmental Planning and Assessment Act to “clarify” that “projects in the Sydney water catchment seeking to expand must maintain or improve water quality compared to their existing consent”.

It will also specifically validate the Springvale mine’s state significant development consent.

The government’s planning minister, Anthony Roberts, said the legislation would “support the construction of a water treatment plant” which he said would eliminate saline discharges.

“This new treatment plant will see zero mine water discharge into the Coxs river, is supported by the EPA and WaterNSW and has separately been approved by the independent Planning Assessment Commission,” he said.

In August the court of appeal determined that the mine was polluting Sydney’s drinking water and therefore operating on an invalid licence.

After a challenge by environment group 4nature, the court found the commission had erred in approving the licence because it involved discharging polluted water into Sydney’s drinking catchment.

The approval involved saline mine water being discharged into the Coxs river, which flows into Lake Burragorang, Sydney’s major drinking-water reservoir.

Liberal Member of the Legislative Council, Minister for Resources, Minister for Energy and Utilities, and Minister for the Arts, Vice-President of the Executive Council, Donald Thomas HARWIN, BEc(Hons) MLC – parliamentary bio.

Liberal Member for Lane Cove, Minister for Planning, Minister for Housing, and Special Minister of State, Leader of the House, Anthony John ROBERTS, MA (Comms) MP – parliamentary bio.

WAKE UP, PRIME MINISTER! A Frustrated Voter Calls on the Australian PM to Redeem Himself

Tony Abbott, in speaking arrant nonsense in the speech he delivered to a collection of climate deniers in the UK recently, has given you a great chance to redeem yourself in relation to climate change action and energy policy.  Abbott has shown how idiotic he is and how indifferent he is to the national interest as well as being totally inconsistent with much of what he espoused when he was Prime Minister.  So why do you keep kowtowing to his silliness and the silliness of his mates?  Why are you reluctant to adopt a clean energy target as recommended by the Chief Scientist? 

You’ve kowtowed to Abbott and his cronies incessantly for months and months – and it’s got you ABSOLUTELY NOWHERE.  They are not going to let up on you – and you’ve lost an enormous amount of public goodwill by your craven behaviour.

It’s time that you took charge and rejected the idiocy of the Liberal and National dinosaurs who want to prevent any more movement towards renewables.  How many of these Abbott-loving clowns are there anyway?  Surely the majority of the Liberal members (If not the Nationals - who are another matter entirely) want to have a bipartisan agreement on climate and energy.  Surely the sensible members of the Government want to give the community and business certainty about the way forward. And surely the more reasonable members of your Government can see that it is IN THE NATIONAL INTEREST TO SECURE A BIPARTISAN AGREEMENT ON THESE IMPORTANT MATTERS.  That is really the only way forward – and it’s what the majority of the community and business want.

If you get a bipartisan agreement with the opposition, it surely won’t matter if Abbott and his dinosaur cronies cross the floor. 

Another matter you should be considering (as I imagine you would be as a politician and a PM in deep trouble) is how history will see you as a leader and your term as PM.  Currently it’s not looking good.

Wake up, Prime Minister, and redeem yourself!

Climateer

NSW North Coast

GuestSpeak is a feature of North Coast Voices allowing Northern Rivers residents to make satirical or serious comment on issues that concern them. Posts of 250-300 words or less can be submitted to ncvguestspeak AT gmail.com.au for consideration. Longer posts will be considered on topical subjects.

Have those who believe climate change is real become a silent majority in Australia?

On 4 October 2017 Australian mainstream media began to publish articles predicting increases in summer temperatures, with 50C extremes becoming common by the end of the century.

The articles spoke of associated increased health risks and heat-related urban infrastructure stress. They mentioned a study published in the science journal Geophysical Research Letters.

Given much of the Australia population experienced the heat extremes of the summer of 2015 these articles should have been speaking to believers when it came to the impact of climate change.

Instead on that Wednesday the comments section of many of the online versions of these articles were choked with anti-science, anti-climate change sentiments. None of those making negative comments appear to have read the research mentioned.

A year earlier, on 26 September 2016, ABC News had reported:

A survey of more than 2,000 Australians by the Climate Institute has found 77 per cent believe climate change is occurring and 90 per cent believe the Federal Government has a responsibility to drive action on it.

The research showed most Australians trust the scientific evidence of climate change and believe there are job and investment opportunities in renewable energy.

If recent reader comments in mainstream media are any indication believers are now becoming a relatively silent majority.

Have they lost heart in the face of successive national leaders like the blindly destructive Abbott and weak-kneed Turnbull?

BACKGROUND

Lewis, S., King, A, & Mitchell, D. (2017) Australia's unprecedented future temperature extremes under Paris limits to warming:

Abstract

Record-breaking temperatures can detrimentally impact ecosystems, infrastructure, and human health. Previous studies show that climate change has influenced some observed extremes, which are expected to become more frequent under enhanced future warming. Understanding the magnitude, as a well as frequency, of such future extremes is critical for limiting detrimental impacts. We focus on temperature changes in Australian regions, including over a major coral reef-building area, and assess the potential magnitude of future extreme temperatures under Paris Agreement global warming targets (1.5°C and 2°C). Under these limits to global mean warming, we determine a set of projected high-magnitude unprecedented Australian temperature extremes. These include extremes unexpected based on observational temperatures, including current record-breaking events. For example, while the difference in global-average warming during the hottest Australian summer and the 2°C Paris target is 1.1°C, extremes of 2.4°C above the observed summer record are simulated. This example represents a more than doubling of the magnitude of extremes, compared with global mean change, and such temperatures are unexpected based on the observed record alone. Projected extremes do not necessarily scale linearly with mean global warming and this effect demonstrates the significant potential benefits of limiting warming to 1.5°C, compared to 2°C or warmer.

Plain Language Summary

Extreme temperatures affect ecosystems, infrastructure, and human health. Understanding how climate change is impacting climate extremes and how extremes will change under future global warming are important scientific research questions. Previous scientific studies have focused on how current temperature extremes have been impacted by climate change, or on how the frequency of these current extremes will change in the future. This study takes a different approach and examines how the severity of future temperature extremes might change in the future. We assess the possible severity of Australian temperature extremes under the limits to warming that are described in the Paris Agreement (1.5{degree sign}C and 2{degree sign}C of global warming above the period prior to industrialization). This study finds that the magnitude of future temperature extremes for Australia does not necessarily increase at the same rate of global warming. The severity of possible future temperature extremes simulated by climate models in this study poses serious challenges for preparedness for future climatic change in Australia. For example, daily temperature extremes of 3.8{degree sign}C above existing records are simulated for Australian states, even under the ambitious Paris efforts to curb global warming.

Lewis, S., King, A, & Perkins-Kirkpatrick, S. (2017) Defining a New Normal for Extremes in a Warming World:

Abstract

The term “new normal” has been used in scientific literature and public commentary to contextualize contemporary climate events as an indicator of a changing climate due to enhanced greenhouse warming. A new normal has been used broadly but tends to be descriptive and ambiguously defined. Here we review previous studies conceptualizing this idea of a new climatological normal and argue that this term should be used cautiously and with explicit definition in order to avoid confusion. We provide a formal definition of a new climate normal relative to present based around record-breaking contemporary events and explore the timing of when such extremes become statistically normal in the future model simulations. Applying this method to the record-breaking global-average 2015 temperatures as a reference event and a suite of model climate models, we determine that 2015 global annual-average temperatures will be the new normal by 2040 in all emissions scenarios. At the regional level, a new normal can be delayed through aggressive greenhouse gas emissions reductions. Using this specific case study to investigate a climatological new normal, our approach demonstrates the greater value of the concept of a climatological new normal for understanding and communicating climate change when the term is explicitly defined. This approach moves us one step closer to understanding how current extremes will change in the future in a warming world.

Full text here. PDF version here.

Lewis, S. & King, A. (2015) Dramatically increased rate of observed hot record breaking in recent Australian temperatures:

Abstract

Persistent extreme temperatures were observed in Australia during 2012–2014. We examine changes in the rate of hot and cold record breaking over the observational record for Australia- and State-wide temperatures. The number of new hot (high-maximum and high-minimum temperatures) temperature records increases dramatically in recent decades, while the number of cold records decreases. In a stationary climate, cold and hot records are expected to occur in equal frequency on longer than interannual time scales; however, during 2000–2014, new hot records outnumber new cold records by 12 to one on average. Coupled Model Intercomparison Project phase 5 experiments reveal increased hot temperature record breaking occurs in simulations that impose anthropogenic forcings but not in natural forcings-only experiments. This disproportionate hot to cold record breaking rates provides a useful indicator of nonstationarity in temperatures, which is related to the underlying mean observed Australian warming trend of 0.9°C since high-quality records began in 1910.

Full text here.

Quotes of the Week

“Tens of millions of dollars are spent annually on political lobbying for the interests of the fossil fuel sector. That investment serves the interests of a small amount of company shareholders in keeping a legacy industry alive, despite the availability of newer, clean technologies, at lower cost. In the wake of these behind-the-scenes policy negotiations, the real and present impacts of climate change, such as bushfires, coastal flooding and reduced crop yields are left at the door of future generations to deal with.” [Professor Tim Flannery writing in The Guardian, 13 September 2017]

“The main problem bedevilling Australia’s energy sector at the moment is a lack of settled policy to define the investment framework. It means companies like AGL have to guess what regulations they will face in the future.” [Journalist Katherine Murphy writing in The Guardian, 12 September 2017]

“Trump is the most ignorant, offensive president of my lifetime. His rise is a direct result of white supremacy. Period." [ESPN SportsCenter cohost Jemele Hill tweeting about US President Donald Trump on 11 September 2017]

Global grain crop yields expected to decrease due to climate change

“Agricultural production is vulnerable to climate change. Understanding climate change, especially the temperature impacts, is critical if policymakers, agriculturalists, and crop breeders are to ensure global food security. Our study, by compiling extensive published results from four analytical methods, shows that independent methods consistently estimated negative temperature impacts on yields of four major crops at the global scale, generally underpinned by similar impacts at country and site scales. Multimethod analyses improved the confidence in assessments of future climate impacts on global major crops, with important implications for developing crop- and region-specific adaptation strategies to ensure future food supply of an increasing world population.” [Chuang Zhao et al, July 2017, Temperature increase reduces global yields of major crops in four independent estimates]

Forbes, 1 September 2017:

Increased temperatures from climate change will reduce yields of the four crops humans depend on most—wheat, rice, corn and soybeans—and the losses have already begun, according to a new meta-study by an international team of researchers.

Humans depend for two thirds of their calories on these four staple crops, but yields of wheat are expected to decrease by 6%, rice by 3.2%, maize by 7.4%, and soybean by 3.1%.

"By combining four different methods, our comprehensive assessment of the impacts of increasing temperatures on major global crops shows substantial risks for agricultural production, already stagnating in some parts of the world," the scientists say in the study, which appears in the latest issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Yield increase has slowed down or even stagnated during the last years in some parts of the world, and further increases in temperature will continue to suppress yields, despite farmers’ adaptation efforts." The study, led by Chuang Zhao of Peking University, cites three other studies documenting declines in crop yields in Europe, Africa, India, China, Central and South America and other regions.

The study of studies was conducted by scientists in China, Germany, Belgium, Italy, France, Spain, The Philippines, and the United States, including the University of Florida, Stanford University, the University of Chicago, and Columbia University in New York. They hoped to settle a question that seemed to have produced conflicting results in the many studies they reviewed: what are the effects on crop yields of temperature increases from anthropogenic climate change?

The study rebuts an argument made by those who argue against mitigating climate change because they say higher CO2 concentrations will increase crop yields. That argument, the scientists say, fails to account for higher temperatures:

"While elevated atmospheric CO2 concentration can stimulate growth when nutrients are not limited, it will also increase canopy temperature from more closed stomata," the scientists say. The stomata are the pores plants use to exchange gases and moisture with the atmosphere. When plants close stomata because of higher temperatures they may conserve water but lose the ability to absorb CO2.

Higher temperatures can also increase atmospheric absorption of water in the plants and in the soil, provoke heat waves and stimulate pests and weeds.

The study anticipates that crop yields will improve in some areas because higher temperatures will lengthen the growing season, but it finds net losses worldwide.

Tweet of the Week

Climate change denialist, anti-science and all round conspiracy theorist, discredited One Nation Senator Malcolm Ieuan Roberts gets disinvited.

Quotes of the Week

“Abdel-Magied's savaging has been so grotesque in its meanness, ugly in its intolerance and alarming in its violence, that it's obvious something else is going on, too – something has been legitimised and unleashed. And it seems to be hostility to Islam, as well as women.” [Julia Baird writing in The Sydney Morning Herald, 14 July 2017]

“A few years ago I talked to [Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull] for two hours about climate change, and he had a great grasp of it. Then he turns around and does nothing. To me, that is truly criminal.” [Marine scientist J.E.N. “Charlie” Vernon quoted in The Sydney Morning Herald, 14 July 2017]

“It has put Australia in a position it's only been in three times before: Minor parties securing more than a quarter of all votes. Every time we have been in this situation, one of the major parties has been reshaped or disappeared.” [Economist Andrew Charlton quoted in The Sydney Morning Herald, 15 July 2017]

Chris Kenny and Andrew Bolt "wilfully misrepresent" according to Crikey and the scientific community

Crikey must have taken some pleasure in publishing this story on 11 July 2017:

How denialists Kenny and Bolt royally screwed up reporting of climate paper.

…..But Kenny knew better, cleverly revealing the real story: “a global warming pause”.

Wrong. There is no global warming pause, as has been widely and repeatedly made clear, for example, here, here and here. Even worse, the paper he referred to said nothing of the sort.

About five seconds into Kenny’s TV, ahem, “report”, he decided to stop being even slightly accurate. “What they’re saying here is that the warming they have on their graphs, on their modelling, is much higher than the warming that has actually occurred.”  

The paper didn’t say this either.

Kenny then went on to quote repeatedly and triumphantly from the paper’s abstract, not the paper itself. Which is a bit weird. It’s like quoting from the back cover of a book, not the book itself. (The abstract of academic papers is typically publicly available, whereas the papers themselves are usually restricted to researchers or universities.) For such a huge, serious science story, wouldn’t you cite the actual paper? Unless, of course, you don’t have access to the paper. And if you don’t have access, have you actually read the thing?

Kenny quoted the last line of the paper’s abstract:

“We conclude that model overestimation of tropospheric warming in the early twenty-first century is partly due to systematic deficiencies in some of the post-2000 external forcings used in the model simulations.”

This, he said, meant that scientists were overstating temperatures. Hence the momentousness of his”story”. Problem is, the paper didn’t say this at all.

If he’d read the last line of the paper itself — and it’s questionable as to whether he read the paper at all — he would have read this:  

“Although scientific discussion about the causes of short-term differences between modelled and observed warming rates is likely to continue, this discussion does not cast doubt on the reality of long-term anthropogenic warming.”

Kenny didn’t report this, though. If he had, he wouldn’t have much of a story. However, he did claim that the paper showed that climate scientists’ models were wrong, that temperatures were overstated and therefore climate change wasn’t such a problem.

Kenny is the earthly representative of his spiritual mentor, Andrew Bolt, who misreported the same story, but went one further, saying that the paper’s lead author, “leading alarmist Ben Santer, now admits the world isn’t warming as predicted by global warming models”.

Not only is Bolt’s report as untrue as Kenny’s — if not more so — but Santer has been at pains to make clear the opposite is the case. For example, he published a fact sheet to accompany the paper Kenny and Bolt reported on. Wait a moment, I here you say, there was a fact sheet? 

Indeed. As Santer explained to me:

“The aim of the fact sheet was to reduce the likelihood of misinterpretation of key findings of our paper. But no matter how carefully or cautiously a paper is written, it is impossible to guard against wilful misrepresentation of results. Sadly, such wilful misrepresentation is now an expected outcome after each paper I publish.”…..

Apart from getting the names of two of the researchers right, little else Kenny said was.

As is evidenced by Kenny’s Heads Up segment posted on YouTube:

https://youtu.be/4TUaDS23Ha0

Here is that fact sheet both Kenny and Bolt appeared to ignore:

Fact sheet for “Causes of differences between model

and satellite tropospheric warming rates”

Benjamin D. Santer, John C. Fyfe, Giuliana Pallotta, Gregory M. Flato, Gerald A. Meehl, Matthew H. England, Ed Hawkins, Michael E. Mann, Jeffrey F. Painter, Céline Bonfils, Ivana Cvijanovic, Carl Mears, Frank J. Wentz, Stephen Po-Chedley, Qiang Fu, and Cheng-Zhi Zou

Published online in Nature Geoscience. DOI:10.1038/NGEO2973.

Question 1: What is the main issue that you look at in your paper?

Answer: Our paper looks at satellite and climate model estimates of global-mean changes in the temperature of the lowest layer of Earth’s atmosphere – the troposphere. It tries to understand why there are differences between modeled and observed tropospheric warming rates over the period of satellite atmospheric temperature measurements (January 1979 to December 2016). These differences have an interesting time signature. In the last two decades of the 20th century, differences between modeled and observed tropospheric warming were generally small. But during most of the early 21st century, the average warming in models was larger than in observations.

We asked whether such differences between modeled and observed warming rates could be explained by natural internal variability of the climate system. Natural internal variability arises from phenomena like El Niños, La Niñas, decadal oscillations in the Pacific,¹ and the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO).

We found that natural internal variability can explain most of the relatively small differences between modeled and observed tropospheric warming in the last two decades of the 20th century, but can’t fully explain why model tropospheric warming is larger than in the satellite data during much of the early 21st century.

Question 2: What is your bottom-line finding?

Answer: The bottom line is that the differences between modeled and observed tropospheric warming contain useful diagnostic information. We use this information to test hypotheses about the causes of these warming rate differences. One hypothesis is that internal variability alone can explain why model tropospheric warming in the early 21st century is larger than in satellite data. Our findings suggest this hypothesis is very unlikely to be correct.

Based on our results, it is far more likely that the early 21st century differences between modeled and observed tropospheric warming rates are due to the combined effects of two factors: 1) Random differences² 1 Such as the closely-related Interdecadal Pacific Oscillation (IPO) and Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO). 2 We analyzed simulations performed with atmosphere-ocean models of the climate system, which produce their own random sequences of internal climate variability. In such models, there is no “synching up” (except by pure chance) between the random sequences of internal variability in the observations and in the model simulations. Different sequences of internal variability in “model world” and in the real world are not a scientific surprise – they are expected, and they can contribute to short-term differences between modeled and observed warming rates. 6/1/17 10:47 AM 2 in how modes of internal variability actually behaved in the real world and in the model simulations; and 2) The fact that some of the external cooling influences which affected “real world” temperature in the early 21st century were not accurately represented in the model simulations.

Question 3: What are the “external cooling influences” you are referring to in your paper?

Answer: Examples of such external cooling influences include a series of moderate volcanic eruptions, a long and unusually low minimum in the Sun’s energy output during the last solar cycle, and an uptick in particulate pollution from Chinese coal-fired power plants. The model simulations were performed before reliable, upto-date information became available about how these external cooling factors evolved in the early 21st century.³

Question 4: Do the problems in representing these external cooling influences point to systematic errors in how sensitive the models are to human-caused greenhouse gas (GHG) increases?

Answer: No, not at all. We are talking about known, well-studied problems with some of the external, climate-influencing “forcing factors” that were used in the model simulations. These problems have nothing to do with the issue of how sensitive models are to GHG increases.

Question 5: Haven’t some scientists claimed that the larger-than-observed model warming in the early 21st century is solely due to over-sensitive models?

Answer: Yes, such claims have been made and continue to be made. We tested the “over-sensitive models” claim in our paper, and found that it does not explain the actual differences between modeled and observed tropospheric warming behavior. Nor does a combination of “over-sensitive models” and natural internal variability plausibly explain the differences. None of our findings call into question the reality of long-term warming of Earth’s troposphere and surface, or cast doubt on prevailing estimates of the amount of warming we can expect from future increases in GHG concentrations.

Question 6: In a recent paper in Scientific Reports, you find that satellite measurements do not show any signs of “leveling off” of tropospheric warming over the past two decades. Aren’t those findings at odds with the findings of the Nature Geoscience paper?

Answer: No. The findings of the two papers are entirely consistent. The Scientific Reports paper compares the satellite tropospheric temperature trend over the past 20 years with many samples of 20-year trends obtained from model simulations of natural internal climate variability.⁴ Even though the most recent 20-year warming trend is smaller than in earlier parts of the satellite record,⁵ it is still significantly larger than the range of 20-year trends caused by internal climate variability alone. From our Scientific Reports study, there is no evidence that satellite data show “leveling off” of tropospheric warming in the last two decades.

The Nature Geoscience paper focuses on different model simulations. It looks at simulations of historical climate change, and asks whether differences between model-simulated and observed tropospheric warming 3 Consider a hypothetical climate model with perfect representation of all important physical processes in the real-world climate system. If such a model were used to simulate historical climate change, but the simulation left out important external cooling influences that affected the real world, the simulated historical warming would tend to be larger than observed. 4 Model estimates of natural internal variability were obtained from so-called “control runs”, with no year-to-year changes in GHGs, volcanic aerosols, the Sun’s energy output, or other external factors. 5 For reasons that are explained in the last paragraph of the answer to Question 2. 6/1/17 10:47 AM 3 could be due to different sequences of internal variability in the real world and in model world. It finds that internal variability alone cannot convincingly explain why models do a reasonable job capturing observed tropospheric temperature changes in the late 20th century, but not in the early 21st century. It also finds that “over-sensitive models” cannot explain the curious structure of model-versus-observed warming rate differences.

The key point here is that the two studies pose different scientific questions. The answers to these questions are complementary, not contradictory.

Question 7: What is the major remaining uncertainty in your study?

Answer: We think that the main uncertainty is in the model estimates of internal climate variability. We rely on these variability estimates to test the two hypotheses mentioned above – that differences between modeled and observed warming rates during much of the early 21st century could be due to: 1) internal variability alone; or 2) the combined effects of “over-sensitive models” and internal variability. If models systematically underestimated the size and the timescales of the major “real-world” internal variability modes, it would be less easy for us to rule out hypotheses 1 and 2.

The problem here is that satellite temperature records are relative short, and are a mixture of both internal variability and temperature responses to external factors (changes in GHGs, particulate pollution, the Sun, volcanic aerosols, etc.). Reliably teasing out the internal variability from such a short, mixed record is a tough job. To be clear: model control simulations⁶ can give us pure “unmixed” estimates of internal variability. Observations cannot, so there is some irreducible uncertainty in judging how well models capture key features of “real world” internal variability.

Previous work that we’ve done has not found a systematic low bias in model estimates of tropospheric temperature variability, but there is some evidence that current models might underestimate the timescale of the IPO. A lot more work needs to be done in comparing modeled and observed variability. We hope that our paper will provide impetus for such work.

Question 8: What are some of the major lessons you’ve learned?

Answer: One of the lessons learned is that “forcing matters”. Through the pioneering work of Susan Solomon and many others, we’ve learned a lot about the external influences that affected real-world temperature in the early 21st century. We now understand that if we systematically misrepresent these external influences in model simulations, we’ll see differences between modeled and observed warming rates. We need to do a better job understanding how these external influences actually changed in the real world, and we need to put our best estimates of these forcing factors into model simulations. This type of work is now happening.

Another valuable lesson learned is that “natural internal variability matters”, particularly when one is comparing modeled and observed temperature changes with different sequences of internal variability, and over short periods (1-2 decades). Many scientists (and many of the authors of the Nature Geoscience paper) have devoted years of their careers to the task of improving the understanding of internal variability.

These lessons will enable us to do two things. First, to more reliably separate internal variability and external influences in observed climate records. And second, to better quantify the relative contributions of internal variability and external influences to the differences between simulated and observed warming rates. The “lessons learned” will help us to better diagnose the causes of these differences.

FOOTNOTES

1 Such as the closely-related Interdecadal Pacific Oscillation (IPO) and Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO).

2 We analyzed simulations performed with atmosphere-ocean models of the climate system, which produce their own random sequences of internal climate variability. In such models, there is no “synching up” (except by pure chance) between the random sequences of internal variability in the observations and in the model simulations. Different sequences of internal variability in “model world” and in the real world are not a scientific surprise – they are expected, and they can contribute to short-term differences between modeled and observed warming rates.

3 Consider a hypothetical climate model with perfect representation of all important physical processes in the real-world climate system. If such a model were used to simulate historical climate change, but the simulation left out important external cooling influences that affected the real world, the simulated historical warming would tend to be larger than observed.

4 Model estimates of natural internal variability were obtained from so-called “control runs”, with no year-to-year changes in GHGs, volcanic aerosols, the Sun’s energy output, or other external factors.

5 For reasons that are explained in the last paragraph of the answer to Question 2.

6 See footnote 4.