How Australia will look in a 3°C warmer world

How Australia will look in a 3°C warmer world

The Australian Academy of Science has just released a landmark report looking at the long-term impacts on Australia from rising temperatures due to global warming. It’s called The Risks to Australia of a 3°C Warmer World, and I believe it is essential reading.

There are a few things that stood out to me from the report:

• There could be a significant structural change to the tourism industry in Australia if average temperatures continue to rise, as Australian tourism top five attractions are nature-based (beaches, wildlife, Great Barrier Reef, wilderness areas and national parks). Higher temperatures will result in significant changes to all of these with a drying of the climate resulting in changing shore lines, deforestation and coral bleaching etc. This will mean current tourism infrastructure will be stranded as the natural attraction will not be there anymore or at least not in the same place.
• Higher temperatures will result in both an overall drier climate but also an increased frequency of extreme weather events. This has a few implications:
  • Australia is currently a net food exporter with good domestic food security. Drier climate will likely result in lower agriculture yields and resulting food inflation, especially as the same will likely happen in the rest of the world.
  • An overall drier climate will likely result in significantly higher water prices in the future than in the past, especially if we continue the Big Australia policy with very high levels of immigration. It will also impact in particular mining operations as they are heavy users of water and during the drought last year several companies had to reduce output as they did not have access to enough water to operate.
  • Extreme weather events are generally causing extensive damage (bush fires, floods, hailstorms etc.) and increased frequency of such events will lead to higher insurance premiums.
• As the ocean absorbs about one-third of all CO2, higher CO2 levels will lead to higher levels of dissolved CO2 which will lead to acidification (lower pH). This will likely impact the productivity of aquaculture operations.
• Rising sea levels will increase the risk of coastal flooding. The report estimates that a rise in average sea levels of 1 meter would put between 160,000-250,000 Australian properties at risk meaning that a decent portion of Australian houses could become worthless within two generations. Other assets will also be threatened, and the report estimates that about $226 billion of total assets are at risk if sea levels rise by just over one meter.
• Heatwaves are likely to be both more frequent and longer lasting which will have negative implications on both human health and on electricity consumption if we continue to rely on air conditioning.

The link to the report is here. The report is about 70 pages long, and is reasonably quick to read.