Floods show need for urgent climate action
A report on inland flooding quietly released by the Queensland government in November 2010 concluded, “with our changing climate, extreme flooding events are likely to become more intense.” And so they have. The Queensland floods have been called “the worst natural disaster in history” by Queensland Premier Anna Bligh. Tragically, twenty people have lost their lives, and many more are still missing. Latest estimates put the financial cost in the billions.
There is a clear link between the severity of these floods and climate change—yet we have heard very little about climate change from our political leaders. NASA’s annual climate report called 2010 as the hottest year on record. Only one year in the whole of the 20th century, 1998, was hotter than any year in the 21st.
Global warming is heating up the ocean. The Bureau of Meteorology’s (BOM’s) annual Australian Climate Statement released on January 5 showed that 2010 sea temperatures in the Asia-Pacific region were the highest on record. More evaporation from warming oceans means higher levels of precipitation in the atmosphere.
Such dramatic shifts in climate fundamentals mean that all “natural” weather events are now in some way influenced by human induced climate change.
The main factor in the current floods is the development of an La Nina weather system in the Pacific Ocean, historically responsible for tropical cyclones and flooding. But as Kevin Trenberth, an IPCC author from New Zealand’s National Centre for Atmospheric Research, explains:
“There is a systematic influence on all of these weather events now-a-days because of the fact that there is [more] water vapor lurking around in the atmosphere than there used to be say 30 years ago. It’s about a 4 per cent extra amount, it invigorates the storms, it provides plenty of moisture for these storms”.
But in Anna Bligh’s outlined agenda for a “Committee of Inquiry” to assess the floods, the issue of climate change is not even mentioned.
Burning coal is Australia’s biggest source of fossil fuel emissions and one of our biggest contributions to climate change. But rather than move to cut emissions, Anna Bligh has instead praised Xstrata and BHP for their donations to the relief effort. She is rushing to repair infrastructure for the coal industry, yet she took virtually no steps to prepare communities for the onslaught.
Julia Gillard has announced budget cuts to cover expenditure on flood relief. Yet she shows no signs of cutting the $9 billion of annual government subsidies to the fossil fuel industry. Instead, $495 million dollars will be cut from renewable energy initiatives including the ‘Solar Flagships’ program that supports investment into large-scale solar power generators.
The planned flood levy is an inefficient and regressive way to raise the expected amount of $1.8 billion dollars. Australians should not have to foot the bill equally for a disaster that we are not all equally responsible for. Bob Brown was right—we need a tax on the multibillion dollar coal companies to pay for the clean-up.
This tragedy underscores the need for drastic and immediate reductions in greenhouse gas emissions. We can’t let our political leaders waste any more time. We need the plans for twelve new-coal fired power stations across the country scrapped and replaced with massive and immediate government investment in renewable energy, and on a greater scale than the national broadband network. This would provide jobs, stimulate the economy and cut emissions. The alternative is simply waiting for extreme weather events to get worse.
The Sydney University Climate Action Collective and Yarra Climate Action Now in Victoria have initiated a petition calling for; A tax on the coal companies and other polluters to help pay for rebuilding after the floods, no levy on taxpayers or cuts to renewable energy programs and policies to urgently transition Australia away from fossil fuels.
Sign online at: http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/tax-polluters-for-climate-disasters/
BY PADDY GIBSON
For more information about the Sydney Uni Climate Action Collective see climateactioncollective.wordpress.com
