Extreme Heat Still Burning Australia in the Summer of 2015

February 11, 2015 – Yesterday I wrote about Australia’s “angry summer.” That was 2013 when Australia experienced its hottest on record. The summer that followed in 2014 turned out to be almost as hot, ranking third. And this summer is proving to be following in their footsteps. In fact, the summers since the turn of the 21st century are almost all record breakers.

In a follow up to yesterday I wanted to share with you why Australia faces unprecedented challenges as a continent and country in this century. That’s because of all the continents on Earth, Australia is the one most feeling the brunt of weather changes scientists attribute to human-caused atmospheric warming. Note I said weather. It only becomes climate when the trend is long term.

But here are some weather facts. In the last month Perth, the capital of Western Australia, saw temperatures hit highs of 44.0 Celsius (111 Fahrenheit) degrees. These temperatures were unprecedented. At the same time record warmth and drought hit Adelaide, the capital of South Australia, contributing to the outbreak of wildfires. Overall the continent and country were once more experiencing the kind of heat of the “angry summer” of 2013. The weather to some degree may explain why Prime Minister Tony Abbott, the climate change sceptic, saw his approval ratings nose dive and why his leadership in the party and country was challenged. Damning evidence from his own government’s report, produced by Australia’s Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO) and the Bureau of Meteorology, pointed to climate projections showing a rise between 2.8 and 5.1 Celsius (5 to 9 Fahrenheit) degrees by the end of the century and ascribing this rise to human activity. One commentator acerbically commented that Australia may be deserving this fate considering the government is hell bent on extracting, exporting and burning as much coal as possible in the coming decades rather than making any effort to meet its past emission reduction targets and implement an overall strategy to reduce its heavily carbon-based economy.

So why Australia? Of all the continental land masses, why is it feeling the impact of global warming more than anywhere else? Yes it’s true that Africa is drying out, as are parts of Brazilian South America, and California, the latter experiencing a drought considered to be the worst in 1,200 years. But compared to Australia’s current challenges, even Africa, Brazil and California’s plights pale. That’s because the Australian continent is far more vulnerable to global warming than any other, a combination of geology and human influences.

In its geological past Australia broke away from Eurasian land mass drifting south and east. In between rose wet and tropical Indonesia and the chain of volcanic islands that are part of the Ring of Fire. When part of Eurasia Australia enjoyed the kind of wet climate found in Southeast Asia and Indonesia today. The continent’s interior was a shallow sea. But as Australia drifted south and east it progressively dried out. Today its interior that once held a sea is largely a vast desert, while coastal regions remain habitable because there is adequate rainfall. That’s geology at work.

But even these areas where most Australians live today are experiencing altered precipitation patterns not brought on by anything new in the geological record. The climate model forecasts as written in the Australian government report predict a future even more extreme. Lower rainfall, and rising seas, and a drop in precipitation of 69% by the end of the century. When you consider that current rainfall levels aren’t all that high it does augur well for the future of the country. Imagine a scenario of more wildfires like those that engulfed Adelaide this summer and in previous summers, Australia’s largest city, Sydney.

Now I suspect those who question human caused climate change can point to Australia’s geological history and state that this is the natural course of events. But what the record shows since 1910, when comprehensive climate data was first collected, suggests something unprecedented. This is not geology at work. This is us globally influencing the climate of a specific continent, and Australia is becoming a major victim.

Related articles across the web

• Climate change drove Australia’s record hot year, says report
• Climate change will hit Australia harder than rest of world, study shows