A Continent on Fire Ignores Climate Change
Originally published on Legal Planet. Reprinted with permission.
Australia is remarkably exposed to climate change and remarkably unwilling to do much about it. Conditions keep getting worse. Yet climate policy in Australia has been treading water or backpedaling for years, as I discussed in an earlier post.
Let's start with the temperature. The Guardian reports that in the year up to July 2019, Alice Springs (in the interior) had 55 days above 104°F. On New Year's Eve of 2018, it set a new record of 113°F. In December 2019, The Washington Post reported, temperatures soared to 104° (40° Celsius) in most of the nation's major cities, with inland areas of Victoria, New South Wales, and South Australia possibly eclipsing 122 degrees (50 Celsius). December 17, 2019, became the hottest day in Australian history, with an average high temperature across country of 105.6°. Two days later, the new record was shattered as the average temperature reached 107.4°. This Saturday, the Sydney area set an all-time record, with one town hitting 120°.
There has also been an ongoing drought. Last November, National Geographic reported that "large swathes of New South Wales are in danger of having no water …
- 1 (current)
