There was flooding and big surf along the New South Wales coast yesterday.
I drove down to Forster last night and thought I would check out the surf this morning. I watched one guy brave the very large waves. He caught a couple and then came in with his surfboard in two pieces - broken.
The storm should have started to fill up the dams north of Sydney.
What do they say about Australia? A land of drought and flooding rains. And we also have some good surf beaches!
Pity SE Qld dams are attacked by NIMBY syndrome not green issues.
But do agree on woeful lack of investment in base infrastructure. But both sides of politics have been told to not borrow by their economists so .. ..
Absolutely correct Arnost, all governments in this country have failed in the area of infrastructure research and development.
I am sure that there are many other major dam project around the Nation which have also been nixed for the same "environmental" reasons, which equate to the pursuit of the "green vote". Yes, governments are quick to blame the water shortages on "global warming" which is a wonderful scapegoat for their own failings.
I would add to your list, base load power stations, construction of which would be fiercely opposed by the green taliban, which now, unfortunatly, seems to hold sway in this country.
Failure in the field of base load infrastructure by governments, is a huge time bomb which is yet to explode.
The "Welcome Reef" Shoalhaven dam is another one that was nixed. Over 40 or so years successive state governments bought the land north of Braidwood for this purpose. If built as planned it would have held 25% more water than Warragamba and suplied water not only to Sydney but to Goulburn and Canberra - where the water is sorely needed. (The infrastructure to get the water from there to Sydney is already in place...)
A succession of governments, both federal and state, have failed dismally to keep up with the needs of infrastructure. Now we have buck passing between the levels of government over division of responsibilities vis a vis maintaining and improving infrastructure - and not only water, but roads, health, education - and nothing gets done! Govt's should either privatise and get out of the way, or make some hard decissions and make things happen rather than spinning propaganda - i.e it's far easier to blame water shortage on global warming rather than accept that it's a result of poor infrastructure planning and development...
cheers
Arnost
Gavin , the snow storm at Canberra should help to replenish the water storages there. My daughter and her husband are graziers at Timor in the Upper Hunter, and last Sat. morn. awoke to find their house, at 550m. surrounded by snow. Glenbawn Dam, which received very little run-off from the rain, should eventually benefit from the widespread heavy snow in the catchment.
The widespread snow falls all along the NSW tablelands over the past week, are not unusual, although Luke may tell us that they are anomolies, which are becoming less and less frequent as Oz heats up. However, I don't think so, I believe that the weather events of the past week all fall within the norm and can't be attributed to global warming, or cooling.
The origional plan for water conservation and flood mitigation in the Hunter was for two major dams, (Glenbawn & Kerabee) in the Upper Hunter, as well as three smaller ones. Glenbawn to capture the eastern catchment and Kerabee the western. By the time that funding and resources were available for Kerabee, the Green Lobby was strong enough to stop it. If built, Kerabee would have largely mitigated the damaging flooding this week and stored valuable water for future use.
Barry Thom did make some sense.
SJT; Professor Thom writing for the Australian had me wondering who suports who on irrigation etc so I did the usual whois on google, I fogot he chaired the State of the Environment (SOE) report way back in 2001.
Interestingly the 2006 SOE report says “Climate change is undoubtedly a threat to Australia’s environment. Although Australia’s climate is so variable that the extent of change is uncertain, there is clear evidence for some warming and changes to rainfall distribution. The so-called millennium drought of the last five years was not the driest period on record in all parts of Australia, but the combination of low rainfall and warm temperatures exacerbated its effects. In the same period, rainfall over central west Australia has been higher than average. These trends are consistent with overall rainfall trends for the last 100 years”.
http://www.environment.gov.au/soe/2006/publications/report/atmosphere.html
The recent flood is a very strong localised event.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,20867,21896637-30417,00.html
"SYDNEY water authorities are 40 years too late to build new dams that could have taken advantage of the flooding rains last weekend, a water expert said yesterday.
Barry Thom from the Wentworth Group warned that it would require the flooding of the picturesque and now World Heritage-listed Colo and Grose valleys in the Blue Mountains to augment Sydney's depleted water storages.
He said that despite the scale of the flooding in the Hunter Valley over the weekend, the recent rain events were still relatively minor compared with the more extensive floods along the east coast of Australia in the 1950s and 70s.
"It was still a very localised event," he said. "We didn't see floods all along the east coast, as we did in the 1970s or in 1955."
Professor Thom said state governments faced decadal shifts in rainfall patterns that have delivered predominantly dry conditions since the early 80s. Most of the network of urban dams in Australia was built during higher rainfall cycles around the 60s.
"If we are going to provide adequate water supplies there needs to be a recognition that, as population grows, we have to be prepared to manage for these lower rainfall conditions," Professor Thom said. "