Jennifer Marohasy

a forum for the discussion of issues concerning the natural environment

Archives for January 2011

Global Weather Disasters: Christopher Monckton responds to Michael Steketee

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According to journalist Michael Steketee writing in The Australian the news is not promising and neither is the data:  Climate change is a reality and we can blame the recent deluge in Queensland and rising temperatures on it.

Looking at the same data, particularly the rainfall data, I’ve come to a completely different conclusion. 

Christopher Monckton has gone to the trouble of immediately writing a detailed response to Mr Steketee…

Read the article by Mr Steketee for an appreciation of what it is to be a true believer: http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/opinion/global-weather-disasters-a-sign-the-heat-is-on/story-e6frg6zo-1225983256858

Read the complete response by Mr Monckton here, for some perspective:
http://scienceandpublicpolicy.org/images/stories/papers/originals/2010_warmest_on_record.pdf

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Where the money is

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A MULTIMILLIONAIRE internet entrepreneur worried about climate change bankrolled the Greens’ federal election surge last year by making the largest single political donation in Australian history.   Read more here.

Annual Climate Statement: Bureau of Meteorology

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According to the annual climate statment from the Australian Bureau of Meteorology released on Wednesday, the Australian mean rainfall total for 2010 was 690 mm which is well above the long-term average of 465 mm. As a result, 2010 was Australia’s wettest year since 2000 and the third-wettest year on record (records commence in 1900).

The statement explains that 2010 began with El Niño conditions in the Pacific followed by a rapid transition into La Niña during autumn. From January to May rainfall was generally above average in most areas except the western half of Western Australia and southern Tasmania. By July, La Niña conditions were well established and most areas of Australia experienced very much above average rainfall. The second half of the year (July to December) was the wettest on record for Australia.” 

The complete statement is here. 

Now all the data is in for 2010 it is possible to construct timeseries graphs for the Murray Darling and Eastern Australia.  The above graphs were constructed at the Bureau site here.  

These charts suggest Australia could be entering a new wet cycle.  Click on the individual charts for a better and larger view.

These charts show that that all the modelling by the CSIRO and others, and all the reports including by Ross Garnaut and Sir Nicolas Stern claiming declining rainfall, were wrong.

This really is good news.

Bill Burrows on the Rockhampton Flood

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SOME of you would have heard of Australian rangeland ecologist, Dr Bill Burrows.  Bill, now retired, lives on the dunes at Emu Park with views of the flood plume flowing north from the Fitzroy River mouth.    According to Bill this has been one of the least dramatic and cleanest floods with only occasional frothing from pollution visible in the Coral Sea and, up to this time, much less debris washing up than even with the much smaller flood in 2006.  

Bill witnessed the 1954 flood (the second highest since Europeans arrived) which was still just receding when a young Queen Elizabeth visited Rockhampton on March 16 that year.   Bill’s father was a station ‘ringer’ during the 1918 flood; known locally as The Great Flood which peaked at 10.03 metres (almost one metre higher than this event).   In the scheme of things, according to Bill, the present case is just another flood and not a particularly severe one relative to 1954 or 1918 – and much cleaner than previous floods, perhaps because of improved land and river bank management.  

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Rhetoric from Climate Minister Disputed by Anthony Cox

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MINISTER for Climate Change and Energy Efficiency, Greg Combet, believes in anthropogenic global warming.  Send him a request asking he justify this belief and the reply is likely to be long and full of appeals to authority: 

“There is clear evidence that our climate is changing, largely due to anthropogenic greenhouse gases.  The Fourth Assessment Report, produced by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in 2007, states that global warming is ‘unequivocal’ and ‘most of the observed increase in globally-averaged temperatures since the mid-20th Century is very likely due to the observed increase in greenhouse gas concentrations’.

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