Climate Change Minister Penny Wong has given a speech in Adelaide at the first forum designed to address the impact of climate change on Australia’s coasts. This is part of a broader programme of adaptation planning, and this particular meeting follows last year’s report on Climate Change Risks to Australia’s Coasts and the establishment of a Coasts and Climate Change Council headed by Tim Flannery.
That Council has recently released its prelimary conclusions.
Wong’s speech is significant for a number of reasons, including the fact that she rebuts the denialist criticisms of the IPCC in detail. As Gary Sauer-Thompson observes:
…development around the Australian coast assumes that sea level and storm events would function as they have in the past and our housing estates, business sites and public utilities have been designed as if the coastline and tidal levels would not change. Such assumptions are no longer valid. The Australian, of course, is not convinced.
Elsewhere: Deltoid [Brian]
Two old geezers on Bondi beach and Bob Carter is all they could dredge up for that oz article?
The Victorian Coastal Council is about to disappear, amalgamated into a Natural Resource Management Council, but their comprehensive look at Victorian coasts is presumably still under way. They talk about rises of “not less than 0.8m”, which is not much guidance to municipalities, where’s the upper bound?
wilful: the Vic Gov’t has a sea level rise benchmark of 80cm by 2100. They also have deigital elevation mapping for the whole coastline – look up their “Future Coasts” project.
The Oz coverage is a beauty. The paper version is even better, runnig a front page headline “Wong wipeout doesn’t wash with locals” and a lovely pic of a beefy surfer. For today at least it’s viewable at http://theaustralian.newspaperdirect.com/epaper/viewer.aspx
wilful, no-one knows where the upper bound is, but the best estimate is still about 2 metres. There are two main provisos. First, it won’t stop there. Over time there is a close correlation between CO2 levels, temperature and sea level rise. Last time we had CO2 levels at present levels we had sea level at 25m higher, plus or minus 5.
In the article at the Oz Bob Carter says on average sea level rise was 1.6mm pa during the last century. Rahmstorf has established a clear relationship between CO2, temperature and sea level rise over the last few decades. In fact temperature and sea level tracked each other perfectly for the whole century. If you look at the trend change you’ll find that at the beginning of the century the increase was 1mm pa. From 1993 onwards it was 3.4mm.
Secondly, 2 metres assumes that not too much will happen to Antarctica. West Antarctica is the wild card. When it starts to go, watch out!
Have a look at Rahmstorf’s slides and see whether you reckon he’s got a better grip on things than Carter.
Senator Wong’s Adelaide speech was very strong – particularly in its rebuttal of denialist claims about the science. Where we need to see more is matching her clear understanding with the actions that science says are needed to avoid dangerous warming.
The Senator claimed as positive outcome from Copenhagen the agreement by developed and developing nations to limit warming to two degrees over pre-industrial levels. A recent presentation by climate researcher, Professor Will Steffen of the ANU, suggests such a limit is becoming increasingly doubtful.
Speaking at the Transition Decade launch in Melbourne last Sunday, Professor Steffen said that more climate risks were coming in under the so-called EU two-degree “guardrail” as our climate knowledge accumulates. That is, more risks are becoming likely at lower temperatures the more we learn about the climate.
Further coverage in today’s edition of The Age, and the earlier report of Senator Wong’s speech.
Darren, it’s the first time Wong has said anything that shows she is keeping abreast of what’s happening.
josh, it’s not a benchmark, it’s a minimum. If I was preparing a Municipal Strategic Statement, I would need more information. They’re not saying 2 metres, and if that’s what the informed best available science is saying, they should be telling people that.
@5, Brian, is that the case? Or could it be that we just haven’t been reading her speeches, as opposed to what’s reported in the media?
Mark, she often mentions “the science” but usually in relation to the 2050 targets, the 2C guardrail etc. When she does she seems unaware of anything that’s been written in the last two, probably three years.
I don’t imagine I’ve read everything she’s said, but that’s my impression.
wilful @ 6, Vermeer and Rahmstorf reckon it’s 80cm to 180cm (see Table 1) under the IPCC scenarios. But please note:
1. Their approach is linear. There is a possibility of a nonlinear reaction of the ice sheets. There are constraints on Greenland because of the underlying saucer-shaped topography. But a fair bit of W Antarctica is under sea level. There the biggest factor is the stability of the Ross and the Ronne ice shelves. I think they are about 600m thick and are assumed to last the century. But the ice is being eaten away from underneath and it’s not possible to say how they will last.
2. Their upper bound is IPCC’s A1F1 scenario. But actual emissions are tracking above A1F1.
3. I think their upper bound is based on IPCC climate sensitivity, which is based on short term feedbacks. It doesn’t take into account Hansen’s notion that real sensitivity at this point with the ice sheets coming into play is more likely double the IPCC standard.
4. Vermeer and Rahmstorf of course know all that, but are acting within the conservative science. They do stress that if we want to change the future we need to act early.
Blanchon and others looked at what happened in the Eemian and think a 2-3 metre surge probably happened towards the end. It was thought to total 4-6 metres above now in the Eemian, so the surge could have happened when said large ice shelves in Antarctica became unstable. That’s just my thought, I haven’t read any scientist saying it.
So I don’t think it’s alarmist to tell people that if we sit on our arse and do nothing we should plan against the possibility of 2 metres rise. My contention is that that is simply not possible, so the only alternative is to get off said arse.
@8 – ok, Brian. Maybe she’s hired some clever staffers recently!
Yes Mark, and if they are smart they’ll watch this space!
thanks wilful, I just went back and checked and you are correct. How you make development and other decisions based on a minimum projection is not clear to me!
Josh@11: it depends on whether you own property there now or not. For me, it’s not buying below the 10m line and paying some attention to access etc in a current worst case scenario. I’d rather rule out a property for unlikely reasons than buy with the intention of being there in 50 years only to find out that it’s waterfront in 30. If I owned watrefront property today I’d be looking for an opportunity to sell it.
What I’m bemused by are developments like Docklands in Melbourne. Lots of “smart” money going into buildings that are expected to be outside the shoreline within 100 years according to the most optimistic forecasts.
moz, I’ll just reference here, yet again, a comment made last year by Barry Brook that “for every 10 cm of sea level rise, the risk of a given extreme event tripled.”
At present sea level rise is just over 3mm pa, which would give us 30+ cm in a century. The rate is increasing if you look at the trend over a few decades. Even if it doesn’t the implications are quite serious. People should be told.
The NSW Government through its Dept of Environment & Climate Change is advising coastal councils to plan for a 0.91 metre SL rise by 2100 as an ‘upper projection’.
Councils with a lot of exposure like Lake Macquarie have borrowed from the Stern Review in hoping for a 3% carbon emmissions reduction per year for the next 30 years to provide a bit of comfort that the less than a metre rise will prove true. The same council has just paid $5.8 million to buy back a stretch of the Swansea channel entrance to NSW’s largest coastal lake. This figure was based on current Valuer General’s calculations but it makes you wonder who thinks it a good investment given the ‘policy’ foundations.
More than thinking Penny Wong wasn’t abreast of what’s happening, I always assumed that she avoided discussing the potential impacts of +2C and above because she well knew the impacts, but was also aware that the policy she had commited to spruik completely fails in any attempt to lessen the threat.
Moz @12: “I’d rather rule out a property for unlikely reasons than buy with the intention of being there in 50 years only to find out that it’s waterfront in 30. If I owned watrefront property today I’d be looking for an opportunity to sell it.”
Exactly!!
The thing is, say you decided not to live there any longer, after 20 years or so. You will probably still be well clear of the shoreline.
However, if the shoreline had been advancing, you would have trouble getting top dollar for it. Why? Because others would have been making similar reasonings to those you are making now, and there would be reduced market demand for risky property.
This trend would become more pronounced with time, so your return on investment would continually shrink, rather than grow.
You can have this place for 11 million euros on the Canal Grande, Venezia….[it includes a water door]:
http://www.prestigeproperty.co.uk/property/124464/Villa-in-Grand-Canal-Venice-Italy/
Buyer beware for Venezia, Italia:
http://geology.com/sea-level-rise/venice.shtml
furious balancing @17, bet they won’t be handing out that map with the property data sheet?
Check out the inundation at lower levels of sea rise! Venice will be in trouble well before 7 m of rise. Never mind storms and king tides.
A couple of years back, better half and myself were looking for a block of land near the coast for retirement, and used this flood map to hatch-out the area which would be below 5 m (we were allowing for the 2m level, plus storms etc). The real estate agent saw what we did to the map he gave us.
“What is that hatching for?”
“Oh nothing,… just allowing for property devaluation in the event of sea level change becoming an accepted fact.”
You should have seen his face go white, staring hard at the map!
Elsewhere: Deltoid