Contemporary politics,local and international current affairs, science, music and extracts from the Queensland Newspaper "THE WORKER" documenting the proud history of the Labour Movement.
MAHATMA GANDHI ~ Truth never damages a cause that is just.
Australians can expect the continuation of above average temperatures this spring.(ABC News: Danielle Bonica)
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Unseasonable
heat across Australia this winter has resulted in all but one capital
experiencing temperatures ranking in the top three warmest on record.
Key points:
The outgoing winter season broke temperature records this year
Winter rainfall was drier than normal on the east coast, but wet across the north
Well above normal temperatures can be expected for the rest of 2023
The
greatest deviations were observed through inland Queensland where
winter temperatures were as much as three degrees above the long-term
average, a substantial figure when averaged across an entire season.
The
main source of this winter's warmth was the ever-increasing background
influence of climate change along with the absence of cold fronts
pushing across south-east states. The lack of these fronts allowed
sub-tropical air from the north to lay stagnant over central and eastern
Australia for extended periods and cumulated in near record high
temperatures near the southern coast this week.
Atmospheric
and oceanic patterns surrounding Australia heavily favour a
continuation of well above normal temperatures for the remainder of the
year.
Winter 2023 breaks records
Hobart
and Adelaide registered their warmest winter on record based off the
mean temperature (average of all minimums and maximums) with data
extending well back into the 1800s.
Hobart's
old record was obliterated and the city's regular winter background, a
snow-capped Mt Wellington, was noticeably absent through most of the
season. The mean temperature this winter of 10.6 degrees Celsius was 2C
above average and half a degree above the previous record from 1988.
Adelaide just edged out its previous record from 2009 by 0.2C, recording a mean winter temperature above 13C for the first time.
Both
Brisbane and Melbourne came within 0.1C of a new record for mean
temperatures, however Brisbane's maximums of 23.5C and Melbourne's
minimums of 8.8C were more than two above average and the highest on
record.
Sydney and Canberra's
winter warmth was second only to the records from 2013. Daytime
temperatures in Sydney were particularly high at 19.5C, two and half
above the long-term average.
The only capital where winter was cooler than average was Perth.
Snow season one of the worst on record
Perisher Ski Centre in late August when snow depth normally reaches a peak.(Supplied: SMSkier)
The
absence of prolonged cold weather led to a disappointing winter for the
Alps, where the lack of snow caused resorts to operate at limited
capacity, and even forced some to close in the middle of peak season.
Lower
elevations suffered through a near snowless winter where rain became
the dominant precipitation and a snow pack failed to develop. The
deepest snow depth at Three Mile Dam near Selwyn Snowfields as measured
by Snowy Hydro was just 13.5 centimetres, the lowest in 50 years.
Many alpine slopes were bare of snow during August.
Deep
Creek, another Snowy Hydro site, has not had any measurable snow lying
on the ground for the past three weeks, a record for August with data
back to the late 1950s.
Higher
slopes fared slightly better, but still suffered from near record low
snowfalls and frequent rain. Spencers Creek and Mt Hotham recorded their
lowest peak snow depths since 2006.
Dry winter for east coast
Rainfall
was variable across Australia this winter; it was wet across the north
and interior and drier than normal near the east coast.
Sydney
was particularly dry, receiving just above 100 millimetres, well below
the city's winter average of 311mm and the driest in 21 years.
Melbourne's total was just below 100mm and the lowest in 12 years
Brisbane, Canberra and Hobart also received well below average rain this winter.
Spring scorcher close to sure thing
The
dice are heavily loaded in favour of a continuation of well above
average temperatures this spring, and for most of Australia below
average rainfall.
The
confidence level of a warm spring is high and it would be no surprise if
it ranks as one of the warmest on record. This bold prediction is due
to numerous climate drivers occurring concurrently:
Climate change ensures nearly all seasons are warmer than normal
A positive Indian Ocean Dipole (IOD) has developed
El Niño is forming
The
likely prevalence of a positive IOD and El Niño also favour below
average rainfall for most of Australia this spring, particularly across
the interior and the southern coastline.
The
only region which the Bureau forecast to have a greater than 50 per
cent chance above median rain is a small pocket of the New South Wales
coast near Port Macquarie.
Tue 29 Aug 2023 19.01 AESTFirst published on Tue 29 Aug 2023 17.50 AESTGlobal
heating will present the Reserve Bank with “acute” challenges,
including heightened uncertainty around how the climate will change and
the resulting impacts on the economy and financial system, the incoming
governor, Michele Bullock, has said.
Bullock,
now deputy RBA governor before her elevation to the top post on 18
September, used her Sir Leslie Melville lecture at the Australian
National University on Tuesday – after a brief disruption from
protesters – to detail how the central bank was preparing for a warming
world and the increased risk of extreme weather events.
While monetary policymakers were familiar
with dealing with supply shocks – such as Covid or Russia’s war on
Ukraine – the potential for prolonged disruptions posed new challenges.
On the other hand, there were also uncertainties about technology and
the speed with which climate, economic and social systems could adapt.
“Climate
change and the actions taken in response will have broad-ranging
implications for the economy, the financial system and society at
large,” Bullock said, including affecting price stability, employment
and stability of the financial system.
“The
timing and intensity of effects are uncertain, and these could be severe
and irreversible if tipping points are reached,” she said.
They also follow recent work by bank officials and researchers into
the physical risks from a more chaotic climate but also the financial
disruption and opportunities as the world shifts away from fossil fuels
into renewables and other low-carbon industries.
Asked
about her priorities when she takes over from Philip Lowe as governor,
Bullock said bringing down inflation would top the list. Inflation “is
coming down and we’re forecasting it to continue to come down, but it’s
still too high”, she said.
“All I can say is
that we may have to raise interest rates again, but we’re watching the
data very carefully, and we’ll be taking decisions for the time being
until next year at least month by month,” Bullock said during the
question and answer session.
On climate
matters, she said “[u]nemployment could be persistently higher if people
are unable or unwilling to leave a region that has suffered from
extreme weather and related job losses.”
“Climate
impacts vary significantly across regions – an impact may be small in
aggregate, but extreme for a local community,” Bullock said.
While
actions taken to reduce emissions may present adjustment costs, but
they will also present opportunities, she said. “Indeed, while there is
much uncertainty in this area, there is general agreement that a timely
and orderly transition will be the less costly approach in the long
run.”
Among the areas of “much uncertainty” was how coal-fired power plants exited the grid in coming decades.
“This
could put upward pressure on energy prices if coal plant closures are
not matched by renewables supply and storage,” Bullock said.
“In
recent years, some plants have brought forward their planned closure
dates,” she said. “Looking forward, coal plant closures may be delayed
to ensure electricity generation is sufficient to meet demand.
“But
this comes with other risks – for example, coal plants may be more
prone to outages as the infrastructure ages,” Bullock said.
“Furthermore, slower coal plant closures would require more rapid
reductions in emissions in other sectors to meet national emissions
targets.”
In analysis conducted by RBA staff,
climate hazard data was used to measure the expected increase in
insurance costs due to climate-related damage – such as more frequent
flooding and more damaging cyclones – which translated into housing
price falls. This work found about 7.5% of properties were in postcodes
that could see property prices decline by 5% or more due to climate
change by 2050, she said.
Bullock
noted these were “early exploratory exercises that covered only some
aspects of climate risk” and had limitations. “Firms and policymakers
will need new and detailed data, capturing the varying effects of
climate change across geographic locations and economic environments,”
she said. “Better reporting of climate risks will help.”
As
for the bank’s own actions, the RBA has set itself a target to reduce
emissions to net zero by 2030. “We are also considering what
sustainability and climate-related financial disclosures we can make,
starting with operational emissions reporting in the 2022/23 annual
report,” she said.
Rapid detection of bushfires using satellites may be the future of fire-fighting, but there are technical challenges.(Shutterstock: Dima Zell)
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In
late 2019, as bushfires lit up Australia's east coast, Simon Jones
received an urgent call from the Victorian Country Fire Authority (CFA).
The
RMIT remote sensing expert and his colleagues, along with the NSW Rural
Fire Service (RFS), were testing an algorithm to automatically detect
bushfires from a feed of weather satellite image-data.
"I got a call from Victoria saying, 'We need this now'", Professor Jones recalled.
"They asked, 'What do we have to do to get it?'"
Soon the CFA had access to the algorithm's fire map, which it used to detect and monitor bushfire activity that summer.
The
2019/20 fire season was followed by a period of higher rainfall and
lower fire risk, and attention turned to fighting the fires of the
future.
An image of bushfires in California, snapped by a low Earth orbit satellite.(Getty: Planet Observer/Univeral Images Group)
Government
agencies, industry and academics gathered in Brisbane last week for the
annual Australasian Fire Authorities Council (AFAC23) conference.
As
the fire agencies sounded the alarm about the upcoming fire
season, delegates wound their way through the product display
area, where robotic dogs stamped their feet, new fire trucks sparkled,
and satellite vendors showed the latest in orbital technology.
The
keynote speaker, Jen Beverly from the University of Alberta, called for
a radical rethink on how to predict, detect and manage bushfires, which
global warming is making more dangerous.
"Historical data and antiquated methods can't be relied on to plan for the future," she said.
Extreme fires are expected to increase globally by up to 14 per cent by 2030 and 50 per cent by 2100, according to the UN.
Bushfire records have tumbled through the 2023 northern summer.
Thousands of people in Greece have fled bushfires this month.(AP: Thodoris Nikolaou)
Experts say fires need to be detected more quickly, so they can be extinguished before they grow too large.
In Australia, most fires are still reported through triple-zero calls, and can burn for hours before authorities are alerted.
The RMIT-developed fire-detection algorithm, trialled in 2019/20, demonstrated the potential for rapid space-based detection.
It
meant fires anywhere in Australia could be detected within less than
half an hour of ignition, or at least before the triple-zero call.
The public Digital Earth Australia platform shows bushfire hotspots, using the RMIT-developed alogrithm.(Supplied: Digital Earth Australia)
It's now been rolled out to all fire-fighting agencies in Australia.
Several commercial systems have also hit the market, with access to data from more satellite feeds.
But fires still aren't being detected as fast as they could be.
All space-based fire detection shares a common problem.
And it isn't the software, it's the hardware.
Rapid fire detection hits a roadblock
In September 2020, Minderoo announced an audacious goal.
The
non-profit would develop the technology and capabilities for
Australia's firefighting agencies to extinguish dangerous fires anywhere
in Australia within one hour.
This speed of response would require detecting the fires with a few minutes of ignition.
Minderoo said it would achieve this by 2025, pledging $70 million to what it dubbed mission "Fire Shield".
The plan was spruiked as the bushfire equivalent of the "moonshot" Apollo missions of the 1960s.
An image of a 2020 NSW bushfire captured by a low Earth orbit satellite.(Supplied: Copernicus Sentinel-2 satellite, ABC Perth)
In the years since, Minderoo has made significant progress, Fire Shield project manager Rania Poullos told the ABC.
FireShield piloted
a system of fire-detection cameras mounted on mobile phone towers,
collaborated with fire agencies on a high-risk lighting alert system,
fast-tracked the delivery of a national bushfire spread simulator, and
tested new technology to map fuel loads, Ms Poullos said.
By 2025, Minderoo will have "tested and proven" the technologies needed to detect fires faster, she added.
But experts say it won't reach its 2025 goal.
Professor Jones, who's not involved with Fire Shield, said the technology was "nowhere near" good enough at the moment.
Being
able to detect dangerous fires anywhere in Australia within minutes of
ignition appears to be at least four years away, he said.
In
June this year, Minderoo sponsored a four-year $16 million XPRIZE
challenge to develop technologies necessary to achieve the Fire Shield
mission.
The global competition has two categories:
Teams will have one minute to accurately detect all fires across a landscape "larger than entire states or countries"
Teams have 10 minutes to autonomously detect and suppress a high-risk fire in a 1,000 square meter area
Both these goals were "immensely challenging," Professor Jones said.
"It’s not just sensing, but AI and integration and getting information to the end user," he said.
Bushfire detection and response like Minderoo proposed for 2025 may be ready in four years' time, by 2027, he added.
"The XPRIZE is a four-year competition. This level of technology is where they're hoping to be in four years."
Why space-based fire detection is so hard
Pointing a satellite at the ground to detect fires is not as simple as it may sound.
For one, the satellites that are parked in one spot above the Earth, locked in geostationary orbit, are very far away.
The geostationarysatellite that
Australia uses for bushfire detection, Japan's Himawari-9, takes one
photo of half of the Earth every 10 minutes.
The Himawari-9 satellite takes a photo of one half of the Earth every 10 minutes.(Supplied: JMA/RAL Space)
It's so far out that a single pixel of this image is about one kilometre across (and even larger in the infrared bands).
This spatial resolution means it's difficult to detect a small, not very intense fire.
Then there's the other problem: time between images.
Factoring
in the delay as the information is passed from Japan's metrological
agency to Australia's, the time between images is about 20
minutes, Professor Jones said.
"It only takes 40 seconds for the algorithm to compute," he said.
"The lag is in the data provision."
The apparent solution to the spatial resolution problem is to deploy satellites that are closer to Earth.
Low-Earth orbit satellites (LEOs) are already used for communications, such as space-based internet services.
Unfortunately, fire-detecting LEOs have their own problems.
Their low and fast orbital path only takes them over the same spot on the surface once every few days.
Services like Starlink deploy constellations of thousands of satellites, so that a LEO is always overhead.
But
there are only a handful of Earth observation satellites available for
fire detection. This means there's long gaps in critical coverage.
"If you have a LEO satellite go overhead and it's cloudy at that point in time, you miss an observation," Professor Jones said.
Speaking
at AFAC23, Rania Poullos said existing satellite capabilities were "not
fit-for-purpose" and called for a global constellation of fire-sensing
LEOs.
"Low-Earth orbit
satellites with fit-for-purpose fire monitoring sensors and near-real
time image processing and analytics can provide unprecedented
situational awareness of bushfires at state, national or even global
scales,” she said.
A history of disappointments
Constellations of satellites at this scale have been proposed before.
In
March 2021, Queensland company Fireball announced plans to launch the
country's first purpose-built fire-detecting LEO. It said it would have
a constellation of 24 within five years.
But the promised launch never went ahead.
The company changed its name to Exci and backed away from the idea.
Speaking last week, Exci CEO Christopher Tylor said space-based detection using LEOs worked out to be too expensive.
To ensure constant coverage of Australia, the constellation would need tens of thousands of LEOs, he said.
"Satellites have a lot of applications in Earth observations, but fire detection is not one of them ... not right now," he said.
Other proposed constellations have also failed to launch.
In September last year, Minderoo CEO Adrian Turner proposed a constellation of hundreds of LEOs to be operational by 2025.
He reportedly said Minderoo was close to committing to using a fleet of LEOs, and the first satellites could be launched in 2022.
"We're really far down the line on this," Mr Turner said at the time.
Those satellites never launched, and, one year later, the future of their constellation idea appears less certain.
Ms Poullos said Minderoo would create opportunities for others to pursue the idea.
She
said the non-profit was "supporting a constellation of global
satellites" by assessing how well they work for bushfire detection.
"This work is still in progress," she said.
A computer graphic showing one of Orora's low Earth orbit fire-detecting satellites.(Supplied: Orora)
This
year's devastating northern hemisphere fire season may finally push
companies and governments to build a large LEO constellation for
bushfires.
In June, the German
company OroraTech said it would launch an eight-satellite constellation,
to be operational by next year's northern summer.
In July, China announced plans for 300 remote-sensing LEOs by 2030.
Lack of funding holding back deployment of new technologies: Minderoo
But a global constellation that's large enough to be useful at detecting bushfires is still many years away.
It almost certainly won't be ready by 2025.
Ms Poullos said there was a "consistent lack of funding for national-scale projects".
"Through
no fault of their own, our state-based fire agencies do not have access
to the full remit of necessary systems and information to develop
effective strategies for fire management, resource allocation and
emergency response planning," she said.
"The
challenge now is for policymakers to fund the development and ongoing
costs of implementing those technologies for fire agencies."
Exci's Christopher Tylor agreed.
State
and territory governments are primarily responsible for disaster
response, while climate adaptation is a federal responsibility.
He said it it wasn't clear who was responsible for improving the country's capacity to rapidly detect bushfires.
"Fire detection was never a problem because up to now we've been relying on the public," he said.
"So it's a complicated subject."
A
spokesperson from the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) said
federal, state and territory governments have co-invested $94 million
this year in bushfire mitigation and preparedness.
They
said the federal government has also upgraded the emergency management
platform used by government agencies and non-government organisations
during a crisis.
"[This
includes] obtaining satellite imagery from partner agencies as well as
predictive analysis to anticipate likely challenges and associated
impacts on communities," the spokesperson said.
In
late September, the federal government will convene a national bushfire
preparedness summit for the first time, bringing together governments,
emergency services, industry and not-for-profit organisations.
"As
natural hazards increase in intensity and frequency, the Australian
Government has a responsibility to be prepared for any threats or risks
that could become crises of national significance," the NEMA
spokesperson said.
A warm end to winter has left Perisher Ski Resort in New South Wales with limited snow cover.(Supplied: Nick Churchill)
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The
sight of grassy slopes at Australia's ski resorts this winter has been
the stuff of nightmares for skiers, snowboarders and mountain lovers.
Key points:
Researchers
analysed 2,234 ski resorts across 28 European countries to assess
changes in snow cover at less than 2C and less than 4C of warming
The modelling measured the potential impacts of artificial snowmaking, which requires heavy water and energy use
Since
the 1950s in Australia, climate change has resulted in a long-term
decline in the maximum depth and duration of the snow season
It
is also a stark reminder of the impacts that human-induced climate
change is already having and a warning of what is to come, according to a
study modelling the impacts of a warmer world on ski resorts in Europe.
Europe is home to about 50 per cent of the world's ski resorts, which depend on reliable and predictable snow cover.
The
research, published in the journal Nature Climate Change, found that 53
per cent of European ski resorts were projected to be at very high risk
of a lack of snow supply with less than 2 degrees Celsius of global
warming above pre-industrial levels.
It found that 98 per cent of resorts would be at very high risk with less than 4C of warming.
Global temperatures sit at 1.2C above pre-industrial levels and an analysis from Carbon Brief shows the world will reach 2C of warming between 2038 and 2072 if emissions remain close to current levels.
The
study's lead author, Samuel Morin from France's National Centre for
Meteorological Research, said the modelling accounted for geography,
elevation and regional differences.
"We
found that if we don't account for snowmaking, the conditions will get
worse … because there is a wide snow decline because of the warming," he
said.
"When it's warmer, snow tends to be replaced by rain in precipitation and the snow melts quicker."
Many mountain economies and communities are dependent on ski resorts in Europe.(Supplied: Simeon Baker Photography)
Dr Morin said "very high risk" was a metric based on how often bad seasons would occur, rather than on average snow conditions.
"What
matters is how often they experience challenging conditions like
snow-scarce, snow-poor winters, and how frequently that happens," he
said.
"It's a bit like a
heatwave — it doesn't matter much to say that the temperature has
increased by one or two degrees locally, on average.
"The question is how frequently you get those extreme, high events.
"What
we call 'very high risk' is when we reach that shift from a
once-in-five years event into once-in-two years events — so basically
going from 20 per cent to 50 per cent of the winters that have those
challenging conditions."
Thousands of snow-making cannons keep ski resorts in the Dolomites in northern Italy open despite ever-diminishing snowfalls.(ABC News: Freya Michie)
Artificial snow's catch-22
One way for ski resorts to shore up conditions is to make artificial snow, but doing so increases water and energy use.
The researchers
used models to quantify the potential impacts of artificial snowmaking
and found the practice could reduce the number of resorts at very high
risk to 27 per cent under the 2C mark and 71 per cent of those under
4C.
But it would come at a cost.
"On
average it's about 20 per cent higher water demand for 2C global
warming and like 30-40 per cent water demand increase for 4C global
warming," Dr Morin said.
"And that goes together with energy and carbon emissions for snowmaking."
Australian resorts, including at Falls Creek, have been reliant on artificial snow this season.(Supplied: David Vincent)
He said the ski industry and governments had some big questions to contemplate.
"Something
we address in that particular paper as well is what is the impact of
ski resorts and ski tourism on climate change and it goes way beyond the
emissions due to snowmaking," Dr Morin said.
"It's
mostly transportation, it's mostly housing, and so that's the key issue
that we point to in the paper as well — how sustainable that is, and
how can ski resort managers, but also the authorities of those mountain
areas … combine adapting to climate change while at the same time
reducing emissions."
Australia is expected to see some bumper snow seasons to come, but falls are becoming less predictable.(Supplied: Omar Elkadi)
It said "the largest declines" came "during spring and at lower altitudes".
"Downward trends in the temporal and spatial extent of snow cover have also been observed," the report said.
"The number of snowfall days has also decreased. Years with persistent heavy snow cover have become rare."
Omar
Elkadi from climate advocacy group Protect Our Winters said focusing
only on snow depth could mask some of the bigger problems.
"If
you look at the snowfall rates say 50 years ago, we used to get a lot
more smaller top-ups, which built the base over time," he said.
"But
recently, what's happened … we call them Snowmageddon … we get these
massive fronts come through, and they drop a huge amount of snow, often,
because they're so strong," he said.
"With
climate change, what we're starting to see is we aren't getting those
smaller top-ups in between, so you have these booms and busts.
"There
will be some great days to come, of course, but as they get warmer, the
margins of error are just becoming finer and finer.
"The booms will be slightly less and the busts will be slightly more prevalent."
Snow coverage was patchy at Perisher Ski Resort and Kosciuszko National Park this year.(Supplied: Nick Churchill)
He said Australian resorts had done a good job of managing the snow this year, but the lower altitude resorts were struggling.
"Ask
a snow-maker if you're out there about this year, because they've just
had so few nights to pump out snow, because the wet bulb temperatures
were too high, the humidity was too high — it was simply too warm," Mr
Elkadi said.
"That's the scary
thing for those low resorts, because they can't actually rely on the
snow-making sometimes — it's a pretty bleak outlook for some of those
resorts."
As in Europe, Mr Elkadi said how Australian resorts managed water and energy use was a big question.
"Snow-making
reduces the variability that we're going to get from climate change for
the ski resorts so they can effectively operate in the right way and
provide a product for their customers," he said.
"But
of course, it's so energy intensive and so water intensive and that
diverts water away from ecosystems as well if not managed correctly."
