The debate between the Coalition and the Labor Party has long had an ethereal dimension. They are in furious contention, though both are promoting a wind/solar future. Labor says it wants to see wind, solar, hydro, and batteries supplying all but 2 per cent of the market, while the Coalition – as per Frontier Economics […]
Southeast Queensland has experienced heavy rain with storms dumping more than 80mm in some parts, causing widespread flash flooding. I am sorry for everyone who has been flooded. It can be devastating – flooding and losing things. Totals of 80 mm, 86 mm and 70 mm in just a few hours are being quoted in […]
"Climate change has increasingly become an issue where parties are being held accountable because of assumed causation by human greenhouse gas emissions. At the international level, the United Nations COP21 led to the Paris agreement in 2015, a legally binding international treaty on climate change, adopted by 196 parties. Subsequently in 2021 at COP26 in Glasgow, […]
One of my interests is in understanding how and why the climate is so stable, for sure it has been over the last several thousand years. Where I live, on the Tropic of Capricorn, daily atmospheric temperatures may fluctuate by 20C, yet the seasonal variation in sea temperatures is less than 10C and if there […]
Carbon dioxide is not evenly distributed around the world. There is a lot more of it in the Northern Hemisphere especially lower in the atmosphere over areas of forested land. These areas are not hotter, quite the opposite. Indeed, the relationship between carbon dioxide and temperature is not at all straightforward. And do you know […]
Australia experienced severe drought during the 1990s, and for much of that decade Australia’s National Climate Centre was headed by meteorologist Bill Kininmonth. He provided advice to government and also to the IPCC. Bill subsequently published an important book entitled ‘Climate Change: A Natural Hazard’. In it he explains that the model of the climate […]
The Australian Institute of Marine Science (AIMS) put out a media release earlier today claiming to have scientifically documented changes in coral cover for the northern section of the Great Barrier Reef, particularly in the vicinity of Lizard Island. Claims include that: The losses of coral we’ve recorded so far are significant. Despite these losses, […]
Most incoming solar radiation is intercepted by tropical oceans. This is where most of the heat comes from, the real heat on Earth. The world’s oceans move some heat to the higher latitudes including North America and Europe by ocean currents. Should a lot of solar radiation come in on one exceptionally sunny day, the oceans […]
I was privileged to have the opportunity to study science at university, and I have always been particularly interested in taxonomy that is naming, defining and classifying groups of organisms based on shared characteristics. This is fundamental to knowing the distribution and abundance of animal species, and how this might change, for example, following severe […]
