Labor to face pressure on environment policies after embarrassing stuff-up,Guardian, Katharine Murphy Political editor@murpharoo, 19 Nov 2018 Party members vow to step up push for national environment protection authority at ALP conference Labor’s Environment Action Network (Lean) has warned the ALP it will not give up on securing a significant overhaul of federal environment laws in the first term of a Shorten government, and a national environment protection authority to police the framework, despite an embarrassing process stuff-up with the draft policy platform.
Burke has written to the party’s national secretary, Noah Carroll, arguing the initiatives were not signed off by the national policy forum in September, and the specific commitments were included in the draft platform in error.
Labor to face pressure on environment policies after embarrassing stuff-up, Guardian, Katharine Murphy Political editor, 19 Nov 2018 “………Environmental approvals are always a sensitive and divisive political issue, but the internal pressure to strengthen the framework from grassroots ALP members in the run-up to the national conference will be fuelled by a new report from the Labor thinktank, the Chifley Research Centre, to be published on Monday.
The new report, prepared in conjunction with Lean, calls for a new legislative framework to replace the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act “in order to enshrine federal government leadership in issues of national and international environmental importance”.
The Chifley report also calls for the creation of a national environment commission. Chifley’s executive director, Brett Gale, said the commission would have an independent institutional structure and be “responsible for a new development approvals process that would get rid of the current system with its long delays and lack of clarity around development approvals”.
“It would provide open and transparent approvals to set guidelines, thus delivering better outcomes for the environment, communities and business,” Gale says.
He says the commission would have a policy focus, conduct Productivity Commission-style inquiries into major environmental issues, and be an advocate for the environment in the national debate.
Green Left, Margaret Gleeson, 15 Nov 18 The Environmental Defenders Office Queensland said new documents raise fresh questions about why the water impacts of Adani’s huge North Galilee Water Scheme will not be assessed under federal laws.
“Queensland is suffering through a severe drought. Despite this, state environment minister Melissa Price decided in September not to apply the “water trigger” assessment on Adani’s proposal to extract river water for up to 60 years, expand a dam and build a pipeline to transport the water to its mine.
This was despite federal environment law dictating that coalmines that are likely to have a significant impact on water resources must undergo a full environmental assessment.
On November 7, the Environmental Defenders Office Queensland (EDO Qld) said that new documents released under a Freedom of Information request raised fresh questions about why the water impacts of Adani’s huge North Galilee Water Scheme — its pipeline from the Suttor River in Queensland to its Carmichael mine site — will not be assessed under federal laws.
The ABC reported that it had seen documents showing that the federal environment department ruled against water experts from the Department of Agriculture and Water who recommended applying the water trigger to Adani’s plan to pump 12 billion litres of river water to the Carmichael mine. …
“Community groups have questioned why the project’s impacts to water resources will not be assessed under the “water trigger”. The documents received by Lock the Gate confirm the community’s concerns.
A submission from the Department of Agriculture and Water Resources advised that the North Galilee Water Scheme could “have a significant impact(s) on a water resource, in relation to coal seam gas development and large coal development, protected under the EPBC Act”.
A submission from Geoscience Australia also called into question Adani’s own referral documents to the federal government, indicating the company failed to consider groundwater dependent ecosystems, despite there being a large number in the affected area.
EDO Qld principal solicitor Sean Ryan said the contents of the documents were “concerning”.
“These new documents raise serious questions as to why the water impacts of this project are not being thoroughly assessed under federal laws,” Ryan said. … ”
Adani water project bypasses full environmental impact assessment against advice,
By the Specialist Reporting Team’s Penny Timms and national environment, science and technology reporter Michael Slezak The Federal Environment Department ruled against the advice of the Government’s own water experts when deciding Adani’s North Galilee Water Scheme, in Central Queensland, did not require a full environmental assessment.
Key points:
Department of Agriculture and Water Resources told Environment Department Adani project could have “significant impact on water resources”
That description should trigger part of legislation relating to water management and require full environmental assessment
Environment Department maintains water project does not need that level of assessment
Documents obtained under Freedom of Information (FOI) and provided to the ABC by activist group Lock the Gate Alliance showed the Department of Agriculture and Water Resources wrote to the Environment Department suggesting the project could activate what is known as the “water trigger”………
Action will ‘clearly have an impact on water resources’The principal solicitor at the Queensland Environmental Defenders Office, Sean Ryan, said the Environment Department should explain how it came to its decision to not require a full environmental assessment.
“It is concerning when these significant environmental laws are not applied to an action that clearly will have a significant impact on water resources,” he said.
Carmel Flint from the Lock the Gate Alliance said she was astounded by the situation.
“We were really shocked to see that these documents had given some pretty clear advice to the department that there was a serious risk to water resources and that they ignored that and pushed thorough the Adani project without requiring an environmental impact assessment,” she said.
“So it just raises real questions about what’s going on inside government.
“We’ve got a department who has this key role of looking after water and agriculture basically raising this concern, saying they consider there would be a significant impact on water resources, and they’ve effectively been overruled.
“That’s just not good enough.”……….
Ms Flint is calling on Environment Minister Melissa Price to act.
“We’re really calling for the Minister now to urgently step in and reverse the decision and require a proper environmental impact assessment and fully apply the water trigger,” she said.
16 October 2018 ‘A group of Traditional Owners from the Northern Territory are in Sydney this week
to challenge Origin Energy over claims it has consent for controversial gas fracking plans
across some of the Northern Territory’s most pristine
landscapes, waterways and iconic tourism regions.
‘Traditional Owners, the Protect Country Alliance and supporters will address
a press conference prior to the AGM, coinciding with the launch of a national campaign
calling on Origin to drop plans to frack the Northern Territory. …
‘Stuart Nuggett [TraditionalOwner] has travelled from the remote township of Elliott
to attend the AGM on behalf of his community, a region at the heart of Origin’s fracking permit acreage:
‘“Our communities haven’t been given enough information about what Origin is planning for our region.
We are worried about the risks fracking brings.
I have concerns over what the impact could be on water. Water is life.
I want the company to listen to our concerns and act on them.”
‘May August is an Alawa grandmother and Traditional Owner
for land under the Origin exploration permits:
‘“We don’t want fracking to start in our area because we have seen
the damage Origin and other companies have done elsewhere in Australia. … ‘
It looks like being Melissa Price – who seems to have a good background in environment, and even believes in climate change! On the other hand, she previously worked for Crossland Resources, (they may or may not be connected to Crossland Uranium Resources).
WA regional MP Melissa Price set to be new federal environment minister , WA Today By Nathan Hondros, 26 August 2018Western Australian MP Melissa Price will be promoted to the environment portfolio as part of Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s Cabinet shake up.
Ms Price, who represents the North West seat of Durack – the largest single member electorate in the world, assisted former environment minister Josh Frydenberg in the role and is understood to have supported Mr Morrison for the Liberal party leadership……..
Ms Price was a lawyer before entering parliament, working as general counsel for CBH Group and Crosslands Resources Ltd.
She has served on parliamentary committees for Agriculture and Industry, Indigenous Affairs, Infrastructure and Communications, and Northern Australia.
Australia’s population growth has several disadvantages, one of the main ones being environmentalimpact, writes Michael Bayliss.
AUSTRALIA IS ON THE CUSP of a major demographic milestone. Our population will reach 25 million by mid-August this year.
We were never expected to reach this “milestone” so soon. In 1999, then Minister for Immigration Philip Ruddock said that there was no need for a population policy as the nation was on course to reach 23 million“by the middle of next century”. Not only have we surpassed 23 million, but we are now heading to reach 40 million by 2050.
The consequences of rapid population growth are many. Housing security, job security, traffic congestion and infrastructure are all concerns increasingly felt by many Australians feeling the pressures of growth. It has been reported that population has become a primary political issue among voters this year.
Another casualty of population growth is Australia’s natural environment. If we agree it is impossible to have a healthy economy on a dead planet, then we should be paying more attention to the impacts of growth in our national backyard.
Australia’s population ballooned quicker than any other developed country on the planet from 1990 to 2017, during which time we have grown by 50%. At the same time, Australia is leading the developed world in terms of rapid land clearance. This is no coincidence.
Australia’s leading ecologists agree growth is a major driver of species loss and degradation of habitats in our country. Successive State of the Environment Reports (at both national and state level) have recorded ongoing deterioration of all environmental indicators; increasing population density, urbanisation and settlement patterns have all been cited as leading causes of this deterioration.
The koala and emu, both Australian icons, are fast becoming the poster animals of the victims of urban sprawl and the clearance of native habitat. It is no coincidence that their habitats overlap with the areas of most rapid urban expansion, for example the peri-urban areas around Sydney and Brisbane. It is anticipated that the continual urban expansion in NSW and Queensland will result in a crash of wild koala populations within several decades. We won’t solve this problem by putting solar panels on the new housing estates or hybrid cars on our roads. Endless urban growth corridors will wreck native habitats, regardless of how “green” these new developments are — and most new suburbs are anything but green.
If the impact on other species is not a strong enough motivator for change, perhaps we should consider the impacts of growth for future generations. Take Melbourne, Australia’s fastest growing capital city, for example. Continued urban sprawl will reduce the city’s food bowl capacitysignificantly — from 40% now to around 18% by 2050.
Last year, our emissions grew by 1.5%, whilst the population grew by almost the same amount. The figures speak for themselves. If we grow by the size of a new Canberra every year, our emissions will go up regardless of how innovative we are or how many plastic bags we no longer use.
This highlights the many difficulties for rapidly growing nations such as Australia to meet their responsibilities under the Paris Agreement. For example, to meet the agreement, Australia will need to reduce national emissions by 30% over the next three decades. Adding an extra 50% to our population over the period will make this monumental task even more difficult to achieve and likely to mask any gains achieved in fuel and energy efficiency over the same period.
The “creeping normalcy” of both densification (more apartment blocks) and urban sprawl are easy to overlook against our busy pace of life. At 1.5% per annum, population increase can appear gradual against the rapid rate of change in our world. But the changes over a decade leave a tangible and permanent legacy on our landscape. The remaining strands of forest and open space on the urban fringe will be swallowed by housing estates while productive farmland is converted into roads and concrete. The hasty planning and development that accompanies rapid population growth locks future generations into high carbon living.
t is often asked as to what is Australia’s optimum population size. Whilst this can be difficult to quantify, most of us can agree that Australia cannot grow at 1.5% per annum indefinitely — the laws of physics do not allow for exponential growth on a finite space.
The idea that Australia is a continent of empty plains and that we can solve the problem by moving inland does hold up to scrutiny. Australia is the world’s second driest continent and our only major river system, the Murray-Darling basin, has a fraction of the water flow compared with other major river systems, such as the Mississippi. We are also one of the least fertile continents on earth, with only 6% of our land area arable, mostly around our capital cities and on the coast. It is these very areas that are being encroached on by urban development. It is not viable to densify much of Australia and to suggest so makes almost as much sense as developing Antarctica.
It is critical that as a nation we can move beyond the assumption that we need to keep growing for growth’s sake. It is necessary that we reduce and level off our carbon emissions, the rate in which we destroy our ecosystem and native habitats and the rate in which we concrete over our food bowls. This requires a transition to a post-growth economy, where our per capita consumption andour population remain stable. Only then can any improvements to technology and efficiency have any lasting impact.
Calls to restore Kakadu National Park to its former glory have come as “music to the ears” of some of its traditional owners.
On Thursday, a joint standing committee on Northern Australia released more than 30 recommendations to improve tourism in remote parts of the Northern Territory, Queensland and Western Australia.
Among those, it called for investment in infrastructure and access to Kakadu National Park, about 150 kilometres south-east of Darwin.
It also called for airports at Jabiru and Cooinda to be upgraded.
Visitation numbers to the dual World Heritage-listed park have dropped by more than 40,000 since 2008, according to data from Parks Australia.
The Gundjeihmi Aboriginal Corporation — representing the traditional owners for parts of Kakadu National Park, the Mirrar clan — has been working on a related master plan for the nearby mining town of Jabiru.
“This report is music to our ears,” said Justin O’Brien, Gundjeihmi’s chief executive.
The committee also recommended the Federal Government set up a peak body for Indigenous tourism operators, working with the Northern Territory, Queensland, and Western Australia.
“For places like Kakadu to be genuine and to be durable, you need genuine relationships and partnerships with Aboriginal people,” Mr O’Brien said.
“For too many years Kakadu’s been unloved, infrastructure’s slipped back, the marketing distribution model has never been properly revised.
“Why not do that now? If mining is leaving, we need to transition.”
Mr O’Brien said he and former NT chief minister Clare Martin met with Federal Government politicians, advisers and bureaucrats in Canberra this week about the future of Jabiru as a Kakadu tourism hub.
He said there was now “in principle” support for the idea after several positive meetings.
“We have in principle support for a strong future for the town, for the town to play a pivotal role in the development of Indigenous tourism across the area,” he said.
“Hopefully we’ll be in a position to announce some great news about Jabiru in the next few months.”
Kakadu ‘tired’ for decades: Tourism body
Tourism Top End, a peak body for tourism businesses in the NT, said the industry had been pushing for upgrades for the “tired” Kakadu National Park for decades.
“It’s been on everyone’s lips in the tourism industry for a very long time,” general manager Trevor Cox said.
“The toilets, the shower blocks, but also getting to our attractions, so the roads infrastructure needs upgrading, the signage needs upgrading, interpretations need upgrading.
“Those sort of things that just put the edge on a visit to a destination — they’re the things that are lacking.”
Kakadu Tourism told the inquiry visitor numbers to the national park had decreased “over recent years” and despite an “encouraging turnaround” in 2016, there was still a “declining trend”.
“So it’s really now up to the Federal Government to roll the sleeves up, release some funding to Parks Australia so we can get Kakadu up to speed,” Mr Cox said.
‘In April Adani applied to the federal Department of Environment and Energy
to expand a dam by 450% and build a pipeline for its Carmichael coalmine,
without an assessment under national environment laws.
‘The project, North Galilee Water Scheme, involves expanding an existing
2.2 billion-litre dam to 10 billion litres and building associated infrastructure,
including 110 kilometres of pipeline to transport water
from the Suttor River and Burdekin Basin. The aim is to supply at least
12.5 gigalitres of fresh water to the Carmichael coalmine and
other mines in the Galilee Basin in central Queensland. …
‘In its application, Adani said the water trigger applies only to
projects associated with extraction. …
‘“It’s an incredibly narrow reading of the EPBC Act,” said Australian Conservation Foundation Stop Adani campaigner Christian Slattery.
“Clearly it’s a project connected with coalmining.”
‘“If this interpretation is accepted by the minister it further demonstrates
the weaknesses of the EPBC Act and the need for a new generation of environmental laws.”
‘Labor’s environment spokesperson Tony Burke said the government should ensure
a thorough and rigorous environmental assessment is conducted:
“Adani cannot evade the scrutiny of the expert independent scientific committee,
and the minister for the environment should not be facilitating an opportunity for Adani
to avoid scientific scrutiny on its use of water.
‘“The more I look at this [Carmichael] project and the way the company has dealt with
different layers of government the more sceptical I have become.”
‘Lock the Gate Alliance campaign coordinator Carmel Flint said the proposal came
when “most of central Queensland is in drought” and the effects on other water users
and the environment must be considered.
‘“Adani is apparently trying to sneak through approval for a massive water scheme
without a full environmental assessment … in our view that’s an activity
which is absolutely required to go through the water trigger,” she said. …
‘Adani’s claims in the application, in relation to consultation with local Traditional Owners
and its track record on adherence to environmental regulations, are spurious at best. …
‘It makes no mention that its dodgy Indigenous Land Use Agreement (ILUA)
is subject to legal challenge. …
‘The Wentworth Group of Concerned Scientists told the Productivity Commission review
that mining exemptions make it difficult to measure the cumulative
impacts of water extraction,
“placing entire groundwater and interconnected surface water systems at risk”. …
‘Environmental Defenders Office Queensland chief executive Jo Bragg said
the community was not given an opportunity to object to the granting of Adani’s water licence.
‘She said the commission’s findings added to pressure on federal Labor
to revoke Adani’s environmental approvals if it wins power.’
The Northern Territory Government has downplayed concern following the ABC’s revelation that drinking water has been high in uranium in three Aboriginal communities for a decade — even as the Power and Water Corporation said a plan to filter heavy metals was still years away.
Key points:
Earlier this week ABC revealed at least three Central Australian communities have uranium levels in drinking water that exceed health guidelines
The NT Health Minister has now responded, saying the NT Health Department and Power and Water were working together on the issue
But medical professionals said the situation was “unacceptable”
The response came as the Australian Medical Association urged the water supplies be fixed, with Aboriginal health organisations describing the situation as “unacceptable”.
Data from the Power and Water Corporation showed Laramba’s water supply contained uranium at higher than 0.04 milligrams per litre (mg/L).
Australian Drinking Water Guidelines outline those levels should not exceed 0.017 mg/L — and the corporation agreed that several communities are drinking water above the national guidelines.
Yet the Power and Water Corporation said a plan to filter out elevated levels of heavy metals like uranium from drinking water in some Central Australian communities is still years away……….
Doctors said fixing the supply should be a priority.
“Contaminants which do make the drinking water unsafe to drink above the guidelines as stipulated, should be treated as a health priority,” AMA president Dr Tony Bartone said.
“All governments — of either jurisdiction — need to ensure that all Australians have access to potable drinking water.”
Dr Bartone said the AMA wanted safe drinking water levels to be part of the Closing the Gap targets, which are currently undergoing a review after 10 years of limited progress.
“Access to safe drinking water is a prerequisite for good health,” he said.
“You can’t really set aspirational targets for health without really pinning the strategy to the building blocks around good health — the social determinants of health.”
John Paterson, chief executive of the Aboriginal Medical Services Alliance Northern Territory, said an independent review was needed “as soon as possible”.
“Governments need to respond to this, we need the experts out there to explain how much contamination is in the water and what solutions have been provided,” he said.
Montebello Islands are a nuclear radiation risk, but boaters and campers flout the rules,ABC North West WABySusan Standen , 17 June 18
The Montebello Islands remain a nuclear radiation risk more than half a century after British bomb tests in the area, yet increasing numbers of people are risking their health by straying too close to the danger zones and even camping there.
There are more than 260 islands and islets in the Montebellos, which lie about 120 kilometres off the coast of Dampier in north-west Western Australia.
They are only accessible by boat and are rich in natural marine diversity and human history.
They are also the site of British nuclear testing in the 1950s.
One of the test blasts conducted by the British military in the 1950s was filmed by a group of men from WA Newspapers camped on Karratha Station, approximately 150 kilometres away, then a thriving sheep station.
A family video of the action was made by station leaseholder Mrs Normie Leslie, mother of well-known local author Tish Lees, who is featured standing on the fence watching the blast.
Today the remoteness of the islands together with other personal health and safety concerns have prompted Parks and Wildlife Service staff to again highlight warnings to boating visitors.
With boating recreation a popular pastime in the coastal towns of Karratha, Dampier, Onslow and Port Hedland, some people are venturing further afield to offshore islands like the Montebellos.
Labor considers tougher environmental laws as branches call for new agency
Tony Burke says Labor isn’t afraid to strengthen laws as grassroots campaign calls for more proactive protections, Guardian, Katharine Murphy Political editor@murpharoo17 May 2018
The shadow environment minister, Tony Burke, has declared Labor is not afraid to strengthen national protections as 371 local branches have endorsed a motion calling on the ALP to set up an independent agency responsible for proactive environmental protection.
A grassroots campaign ahead of Labor’s national conference in July spearheaded by the activist group the Labor Environment Action Network is building support from rank-and-file members for the creation of a federal environmental protection agency, a regulator that could be the decision-maker for approvals rather than the environment minister – and a second organisation, an environment commission, to drive proactive protection of environmental assets.
Separate to the LEAN push, which is about securing a substantial overhaul and strengthening of the existing framework, the draft national platform also proposes inserting a land-clearing trigger in the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Act, which links the issue explicitly to the management of climate change.
It also proposes consideration of a separate national parks trigger.
Australia is one the world’s top 20 water-stressed nations but a shift to more renewable energy could lessen the nation’s water pressure.
A report by the World Resources Industry identified Australia as one country vulnerable to water stress where the potential for cheap renewable energy, solar and wind as opposed to fossil fuels, could reduce water consumption country-wide as these technologies use minimal – or zero – water.
Land managers in Australia have adopted many of the fire-control practices of the aborigines and have partnered with native people.
While the skill of aborigines with fire had been noted before the giant brushfires – early settlers remarked on the “park-like” nature of the landscape – and studied before, it’s taken on new urgency. That’s why Australian land managers have adopted many of the ideas and partnered with native people as co-managers. The fire practices of the aborigines are also being taught and used in other countries.
Scientists have looked to Australian natives for other insights into the natural world. A team of researchers collaborated with natives based on their observations of kites and falcons that fly with flaming branches from a forest fire to start other fires. It’s well known that birds will hunt mice and lizards as they flee the flames of a wildfire. But stories among indigenous people in northern Australia held that some birds actually started fires by dropping a burning branch in unburned places. Based on this TEK, researchers watched and documented this behavior.
Aboriginal people “don’t see themselves as superior to or separated from animals. They are walking storehouses of knowledge”
From Alaska to Australia, scientists are turning to the knowledge of traditional people for a deeper understanding of the natural world. What they are learning is helping them discover more about everything from melting Arctic ice, to protecting fish stocks, to controlling wildfires. BY JIM ROBBINS•APRIL 26, 2018
While he was interviewing Inuit elders in Alaska to find out more about their knowledge of beluga whales and how the mammals might respond to the changing Arctic, researcher Henry Huntington lost track of the conversation as the hunters suddenly switched from the subject of belugas to beavers.
It turned out though, that the hunters were still really talking about whales. There had been an increase in beaver populations, they explained, which had reduced spawning habitat for salmon and other fish, which meant less prey for the belugas and so fewer whales.
“It was a more holistic view of the ecosystem,” said Huntington. And an important tip for whale researchers. “It would be pretty rare for someone studying belugas to be thinking about freshwater ecology.”
Around the globe, researchers are turning to what is known as Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK) to fill out an understanding of the natural world. TEK is deep knowledge of a place that has been painstakingly discovered by those who have adapted to it over thousands of years. “People have relied on this detailed knowledge for their survival,” Huntington and a colleague wrote in an article on the subject. “They have literally staked their lives on its accuracy and repeatability.”
Tapping into this traditional wisdom is playing an outsized role in the Arctic, where change is happening rapidly.
Marine heatwaves are increasing in their frequency and duration at an accelerating rate in many parts of the world, especially around Australia, a team of international scientists has found.
The number of oceanic heatwave days a year has increased by 54 per cent in the past century globally, the researchers determined, using data of sea-surface temperatures from long-established sites and satellites.
“We have seen an increasing trend in the frequency and duration [of marine heatwaves], and that trend has accelerated in the past 30 years or so,” said Lisa Alexander, associate professor at University of NSW’s Climate Change Research Centre, and an author of the paper published in Nature Communications on Wednesday.
Rather than a precursor, the number of heatwave days may even be an underestimate of what is to come as the planet warms, Professor Alexander said. “We could see it accelerated even more, given what we’ve seen recently,” she said.
Episodes of extreme heat over land have been studied more closely than those beneath the waves. Oceans, though, not only absorb about 93 per cent of the additional heat being trapped by rising greenhouse gas levels, they are also the main driver of the Earth’s climate.
Thank goodness we have the oceans as this massive sink [for both heat and carbon dioxide] but they are also changing too, and we tend to forget that,” said Sarah Perkins-Kirkpatrick, an author of the paper and also a researcher at the UNSW CCRC.
Dr Perkins-Kirkpatrick likened the oceans to the tropics, where temperatures typically move within a narrow band. Even moderate increases can have big impacts on humans and ecosystems alike.
The paper, which defined heatwaves as at least five consecutive days with sea-surface temperatures in the top 10 per cent of warmth over a 30-year period, found such events were on the increase in most parts of the world.
Global hot spots
Australia was home, along with the north Pacific and north Atlantic, of some of the global ocean hot spots.
While coral bleaching from extended heat over the Great Barrier Reef and elsewhere in recent years had drawn international attention, many other regions had seen “substantial ecological and economic impacts”, as fishing and tourism industries they support were hit, the paper said.
For instance, an extreme event off the Western Australia coast in 2011 led to large-scale effects in the Ningaloo region. Kelp forests south of Ningaloo were hammered and are yet to recover.
“You only need to have that one event to have this complete shift in the ecological environments,” Dr Perkins-Kirkpatrick said, noting such changes have tended to be less dramatic on land.
“Will it ever change back? Have we reached the point of no return for certain marine environments?” she said. “There are a lot of unknowns there, but it’s quite concerning.”
Coral bleaching events have garnered much of the attention but many other marine species, including kelp forests off Tasmania, can be vulnerable to changing conditions.
“[Corals] are the sort of poster child for ecological change, and other systems aren’t maybe as pretty to look at,” Professor Alexander said. “But [others] are equally as important in the ecosystems and food chains”.
Tasman Sea heat
The westward boundaries of the continents tend to be where oceans are warming fastest, including off the east Australian coast.
The Tasman Sea had experienced an increase in heatwave events even before this past summer’s record burst, that fell outside the researchers’ period of study.
In a special climate statement released last month by the Bureau of Meteorology and New Zealand’s National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research, the agencies found the south Tasman Sea recorded sea-surface anomalies of as much as 2.12 degrees last December and 1.96 degrees in January.
Those readings were compared with a 1981-2010 baseline – and broke the record for those months by about a degree – an unusual departure from the norm for ocean readings.
Read summaries of submissions to the Senate, re the Selection process for a national radioactive waste management facility in South Australia. Each summary has a link to the full submission. Obviously the Department of Industry Innovation and Science (DIIS) was not happy with the majority of submissions opposing the process, so now are trying to get a better (for them) result
Read the brief summaries of submissions – 55 anti-nuclear, 41 pro nuclear (13 confidential) , with links to each full submission published on this Antinuclear website.
See our page: Submissions on Radioactive Waste Code 2018/ Submissions published by ARPANSA are overwhelmingly critical, and in opposition to the Federal nuclear dump plan for rural South Australia. [not to be confused with the current SENATE INQUIRY Selection process for a national radioactive waste management facility in South Australia.]
