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The release of the CSIRO's report on Australia's climate future brings a sharp focus on what is at stake as we evaluate Liberal and Labor policies on climate change. Among the most alarming projections is that just 60 years from now Australia could be up to five degrees hotter and 40 to 80 per cent drier (see Future is bleak for Australian climate, Cosmos Online).
In the same week we learned that Australia's population will reach 33 million by 2050 — just 40 years from now. Put the projections together and you can see the future shape of our cities. By 2050, for example, Melbourne will have 6 million inhabitants (up from 3.6 million now), far greater heat-stress and bushfire threat, and far less water.
Even with our current level of population and water availability, much of Australia is struggling. Our lower Murray wine industry is facing collapse and Adelaide is our most water-stressed capital. If the water crisis continues into this summer the region faces a full-blown disaster.
Never has the case for sustainability been more evident, or more ignored by our political leaders. Treasurer and deputy leader of the governing Liberal Party, Peter Costello, is a great population booster, yet we have heard nothing from him about where the water will come from for our increased population. And it's now self-evident that the climate problem requires urgent action. We must remember that the CSIRO (the Australian government research agency) projections are not a fait accompli but a call to action.
Australia can do much to reduce its own emissions, and I believe it has enormous potential to impact on global emissions. Doing so could avoid the worse-case scenarios: our future need not be a train wreck of unsustainability, but the time left within which to act is limited indeed.
After two decades of dithering, the conditions for developing a global treaty limiting greenhouse gas pollution has never looked more promising. Only Australia and the U.S. — which remain adamantly opposed to ratifying the Kyoto Protocol — stand in the way of concerted global action. Even China has said that it will join the developed world in reducing emissions if we act in concert.
The governments of both Australia and the U.S. are still trying to promote alternative approaches, by holding meetings outside the U.N. process that rely on voluntary measures. But as the CSIRO report makes clear, we are well and truly out of time to pursue such means. The reality is that the Kyoto negotiations are the only negotiations with a hope of creating a global treaty, and a global treaty is indispensable for combating a global pollution problem.
If the CSIRO's report is not to become Australia's epitaph, our country must live up to its global climate responsibilities. The following actions are required — and this year, not next:
1. Immediate ratification of the Kyoto Protocol. In light of the building climate disaster, I respectfully ask our Prime Minister to recognise the true urgency of the climate situation and announce ratification of the Kyoto Protocol, and to talk to our American allies about the reason for that decision. Because President George W. Bush holds John Howard in such high regard, our Prime Minister is in a position to do far greater good for Earth's climate than the Labor Party could ever contemplate.
2. Swift and dramatic reduction of Australia's emissions. Australia must be set on a trajectory of emissions reduction that will see us play our part in keeping humanity safe from dangerous climate change. To achieve climate stability, actions taken at this late date will be arduous and difficult. In effect we will need to cease greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuels altogether within the next 40 years. This means rapid development of alternative energy sources, mandated phase-outs of coal-fired power plants and mandated switching to biofuels. None of this will be achieved without a cost of carbon pollution less than A$70 per tonne. But this will not be sufficient. In addition, stretching mandated renewable energy targets will be required, as will greatly enhanced funds to emerging renewable energy technologies.
3. Restore the world's tropical rainforests. Tropical rainforests play a uniquely important role in the Earth's climate system, yet half are already gone and the remainder under threat. Australia can play a leading role in restoring the world's tropical forests, but funding and planned action will have to be greatly enhanced. As the eighth richest country, Australia should lead a global initiative aimed at sequestering 10 gigatonnes of carbon in regrowing tropical forests, per year, by 2030. This could be done directly, at the village level using technologies such as Google Earth and EBay, if a computer were placed in each village school in the tropics.
4. Reform agriculture to store carbon. New advances in biomass-based technologies indicate that the potential to generate electricity and biofuel, and to sequester carbon in soils, is enormous. Brown-coal-fired power plants should be immediately converted to biomass combustion. Pyrolysis machines need to be subsidised and installed on all Australian farms, and the electricity and biofuel they generate become integrated into our energy systems.
Australia again could lead a global initiative here, with the aim of drawing down a further 10 gigatonnes of carbon, per year, by 2030. Were all of these initiatives successful, amazing things could be achieved.
By 2030 Australia's emissions could stand at just 40 per cent of those of 1990, and globally we could be drawing down 20 gigatonnes of carbon pollution per year from our atmosphere. That's 10 per cent of the total burden of human-made carbon dioxide pollution in the atmosphere.
Consequently, dangerous climate change could become a receding spectre. But only if we act fast.
Tim Flannery is Australian of the Year 2007, chairman of the Copenhagen Climate Council and a professor at Macquarie University.
In my opinion this sounds
In my opinion this sounds like Tim being tim , signing Kyoto is a political act which will do nothing to solve the upcoming climate change its about as useful as waving a bed sheet at the moon to achieve the same result .
What is needed at the moment is planning to overcome the future changes that are already built into the earth systems .
To me it seems that there is a lot of money/power being made by selling guilt to the Australian public and elsewhere as a whole .
How much so called green electricity is being produced compared to how much is being sold? take W.A. we were told that the desal. plant would be run on green energy from one site , there may be enough installed capacity there to do this but the output is very much less than the plant requires , no wind farm produces much more than 30% of the installed capacity this one was reported to be producing just above 20%.
How Australia with a population of about 20 M . can exist with the coming climate changes is the major question that needs answering before making drastic changes , remember what the untended result was from banning DDT ,10s of millions of dead children from Malaria in the 3rd world.
We need to take action to protect our place on the Earth but the Earth does not need saving from climate change it has done a very good job in the past without our help . Rant Ended
A Better Option
In the 1950’s, when the Snowy River Scheme was completed it was suggested that Australia’s next big development should be the creation of a channel between Spencer Gulf and Lake Eyre. Lake Eyre is 287 feet below sea level and so by opening a channel to the sea we would create a permanent inland sea, 287 feet deep. This inland sea would generate substantial evaporation and significantly enhance rainfall in vast areas of the country. This would ensure that as long as new storage reserves are completed, to meet population growth, adequate water would be available to meet future needs. The tidal channel that feeds the inland sea would also be capable of generating substantial hydro-electricity, reducing our dependence on fossil fuels or nuclear technology.
Instead of looking at a short-term solution simply because it is the most economic we should be developing long term plans to protect future generations and develop the country into a more productive region. We have the technology to provide a better climate and more reliable rainfall and we can ensure the well being and financial security of our children and grandchildren.
Signing the KYOTO protocol
Signing the KYOTO protocol is a total waste of time unless the whole WORLD and that includes every nation otherwise you will achieve nothing just move polution around the globe. It is one big bowl and a total waste of resources trying to hold back in Australia, we just aint big enough to change anything unless the whole of the world play the game too. Just take the UN for example what have they achieved as no country looking for polical advantage takes one srap of notice of what they say and I see no evedence of thay even being of much use when inocent people are being attacked as thier troops are ordered not to shoot.
Sure we should be taking every step we can to clean up our own bavk yard but KYOTO a bunch of self interested do gooders swaning around the world poluting it with AIR TRAVELL.
Neil
Signing the KYOTO protocol
"Signing the KYOTO protocol is a total waste of time unless the whole WORLD and that includes every nation otherwise you will achieve nothing just move polution around the globe."
The whole point of what the article proposed was for Australia to sign Kyoto and use its infleunce to get the US to the table. If China is serious about taking its part in addressing Climate change then thats more than the lions share of carbon producers addressing the problem. You can't cite the politic of UN military actions to analyse climate change. There's a whole bucket of political and economic issues that also come into play not to mention the various UN scientific committee reports that also influence UN actions on climate change. None of which is used in deciding UN military interventions.
"It is one big bowl and a total waste of resources trying to hold back in Australia, we just aint big enough to change anything unless the whole of the world play the game too."
I really frightens me to read comments like this. Its like saying its all to hard so lets just give up now. Should we just sit on out hands and do nothing? One person, one country can make a difference but it has to start somewhere. If we clean up our own back yard and develop economical green power technologies theres huge markets like China and India crying out for power generation. Tap into theses countries and you start changing the world.
Afterall we export millions of tonnes of coal per year over seas and this has the effect of changing the world, although in this case for the worst so why not do something for the better instead!
Inland Sea
I have been doing some research into the possibility of flooding inland Australia to produce more rainfall. The CSIRO have done a study into flooding lake Eyre and have found that the impact would not be worth the damage to the current eco-system in place there. I think we need to consider something more drastic, including diverting rivers inland and "digging out" a larger chunk of the Dead Heart of Australia to produce a much larger inland sea.
If anyone has heard of a study being done on the viability of such a plan I would be interested in reading it.