The approved version of the Summary for Policymakers (SPM) of the Special Report has been released and is available at: www.ipcc-wg2.gov/SREX/

An IPCC press release is available here.

Three Australian Lead Authors were involved with the report (Neville Nicholls, John Handmer and Kathleen McInnes), with Neville and John currently in Uganda.

Reaction from scientists in the UK and Canada are also available on request thanks to our colleagues at the UK SMC and SMC of Canada.

Feel free to use the following quote in your stories. Any further comments will be posted here. For any other queries, don’t hesitate to contact us on (08) 7120 8666 or by email.

Dr Kathleen McInnes is from the Climate Change Research Group (Sea Level Rise and Coasts) at the Centre for Australian Weather and Climate Research, a partnership between CSIRO and the Bureau of Meteorology.  She is one of three Australian Lead Authors involved with the report and discusses some of the Australian findings in the SPM released overnight.

“Recognising that the effects of climate change will be felt most acutely through extreme events, this report is the first comprehensive assessment that focuses on extreme events as well as bringing together the experience of experts in climate change adaptation and disaster risk management to consider options for managing the risks associated with climate change.

While more regional detail will be available when the full report is released in February next year, some of the findings for Australia are that it is likely that there has been an overall decrease in the number of cold days and nights and an overall increase in the number of warm days and nights. While it is likely that the storm systems that affect southern Australia have moved poleward, changes in observing capabilities means there is low confidence in changes in tropical cyclone activity.

It is likely that anthropogenic influences have led to warming of extreme daily minimum and maximum temperatures on the global scale and have led to increasing extreme coastal high water due to mean sea level contributions.

Because of the nature of extremes (i.e. their rarity), changes in many extremes and their causes are assessed with lower levels of confidence due to such factors as length of observational record and the influence of natural variability. However, low confidence in an observed change neither implies nor excludes the possibility that a change has occurred.

It is virtually certain that increases in the frequency and magnitude of warm daily temperature extremes and decreases in cold extremes will occur through the 21st century and it is very likely that the length, frequency and/or intensity of warm spells, including heat waves, will continue to increase over most land areas. It is also likely that that the frequency of heavy precipitation or the proportion of total rainfall from heavy falls will increase in the 21st century over many areas of the globe. In Australia by the end of the 21^st Century, a 1 in 20 year daily maximum temperature is projected to occur once every 1 to 10 years. It is very likely that mean sea level rise will contribute to upward trends in extreme coastal high water levels in the future.

As well as addressing climate extremes, this report also integrates perspectives from research communities studying adaptation to climate change, and disaster risk management. The severity of the impacts of extreme and non-extreme weather and climate events depends strongly on the level of vulnerability and exposure of human, ecological and physical systems to these events.”

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As the year kicked off with severe flooding and storms in Queensland and Victoria and severe bushfires in WA, a question began to appear – just how vulnerable are we to such extreme events when they occur in quick succession? How many cyclones or extreme flooding events can one town, region or country manage and over what time period? This question is not unique to Australia.  Extreme weather events throughout the world are likely to be exacerbated by climate change, with a strong chance that warming will lead to more intense storms, floods and heatwaves. We may be looking at a future in which serious extreme weather can no longer be called “one-off” or “1-in-100 year” events. How can we better manage the risks and prepare ourselves for more natural disasters in future?

A number of key scientists from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) are meeting on the Gold Coast in Queensland from May 16-19 to discuss this highly topical issue. The AusSMC has organised an online briefing with some of the key people.

The briefing included:

• An update on the latest science of extreme weather events and disasters in relation to climate change
• An update on the IPCC special report, Managing the Risks of Extreme Events and Disasters to Advance Climate Change Adaptation, scheduled for release later in the year

View the full presentation here (Webex)

SPEAKERS:

• Dr Rajendra K Pachauri, Chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Bio (pdf) | Listen (mp3)
  
• Professor Vicente Barros, Co-Chair of IPCC Working Group II of the fifth Assessment Report due out in 2013 and is currently Emeritus Professor at the University of Buenos Aires in Argentina. Bio (pdf) | Listen (mp3)
  
• Professor Thomas Stocker, Co-Chair of the IPCC Working Group I of the fifth Assessment Report and is currently Professor of Climate and Environmental Physics at the University of Bern in Switzerland. Bio (pdf) | Listen (mp3)
  
• Professor Neville Nicholls is a Professorial Fellow in the Regional Climate Group at Monash University, has contributed to IPCC assessments for many years and is a lead author on the IPCC special report on extreme events. Bio (pdf) | Listen (mp3)
• Dr Padma Lal, Technical Advisor, Oceania, IUCN. Listen (mp3)
• Listen to the Q and A session here (mp3)
  
  

BRIEFING DETAILS:

DATE:  Monday 16 May
START TIME: 12.30pm AEST
DURATION: 45 min
VENUE:  Online

For further information, please contact the AusSMC on 08 7120 8666 or email us.

The full press release from the WMO is available here.

Feel free to use these quotes in your stories.  If you would like to speak to an expert, please don’t hesitate to contact us on (08) 7120 8666 or by email.

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Professor Matthew England is an ARC Federation Fellow, and Joint Director of the University of New South Wales Climate Change Research Centre

“This is cause for concern. With much of the year in a cool La Niña phase 2010 was not expected to break the temperature records of 2005 and 1998. Taken together with other observations, such as accelerating ice melt, increased humidity, more extreme events and rising sea-levels, climate change is progressing at what should be seen as an alarming rate.”

———–

Associate Professor Kevin Walsh is an Associate Professor of Meteorology in the School of Earth Sciences at the University of Melbourne

 ”This result is not surprising and is consistent with the warming expected from anthropogenic climate change.”

 ———–

Professor Steven Sherwood is in Physical Meteorology and Atmospheric Climate Dynamics at the Climate Change Research Centre, University of New South Wales

“There is now a statistical dead heat for the warmest year globally, between 1998, 2005, and 2010. More important however is the continuing, underlying warming trend that continues as predicted from the net heating of the planet by added greenhouse gases. Every year since 2000 would have broken the record that stood in 1997, and the last decade was the warmest on record (and probably for thousands of years). I am confident that a new annual record will be set some time in the coming years, as the system hasn’t even caught up with the greenhouse gases already emitted.”

———– 

Professor Jean Palutikof is Director of the National Climate Change Adaptation Research Facility at Griffith University, Qld

“The news that 2010 was one of the warmest years on record will not be a huge surprise to climate scientists, except to cause them to reflect that, in a La Niña year, it’s an indicator of how rapidly things are happening. The greater challenge now is to understand how the worldwide devastating floods of 2010 and now 2011 relate to global warming and climate change.”

———–

Ian Lowe is Emeritus professor of science, technology and society at Griffith University, Qld, and President of the Australian Conservation Foundation

 ”The data confirm the warming trend that has been evident for several decades. For 25 years, climate science has been warning that we would experience increasing average temperatures, rising sea levels, changing rainfall patterns and more frequent extreme events: droughts, heatwaves, severe bushfires and floods. Given the events we are seeing with an increase in average global temperature of about 0.8 degrees over pre-industrial levels, we should be worried about even the optimistic view that we might stabilise the temperature at 2 degrees above those levels, i.e. another 1.2 degrees from where we are now. We should be terrified about the consequences of the much greater warming that would be the result if the present inaction continues. In the context of recent extreme events, it is the height of irresponsibility to be considering new coal mines, coal-fired power stations and coal seam gas operations. We should be urgently driving the transition to renewable energy and urging concerted global action to slow down the warming of the Earth.”

———–

ONLINE BACKGROUND BRIEFING – Tue 29 June at 12.40pm AEST online

As efforts to cut greenhouse gas emissions are delayed, many experts suggest that disastrous climate change is already on its way. So should we just learn to cope? Even if the world were to stop all greenhouse gas emissions today, a certain amount of warming may already be inevitable. Adapting to these changes might be the only way to become resilient to future climate change.  But how hot is too hot to adapt? How small is the window of time we have to prepare?  And does adapting mean giving up on preventing climate change?

This week Australia’s first international conference on adapting to climate change is being held on the Gold Coast. This briefing will bring together three key plenary speakers who are also some of the  world’s leading climate experts.

This is the first of two briefings the AusSMC will be doing from the conference this week. To download the Conference Handbook that includes all abstracts, speaker bios and a full program of presentations visit www.nccarf.edu.au/conference2010

BRIEFING DETAILS:
DATE: Tue 29 June
START TIME: 12.40pm AEST
DURATION: 45 min
VENUE:  Online

To follow the full media briefing, click here (Webex)

SPEAKERS:

• Jean-Pascal van Ypersele, Vice-Chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change - Climate Change, Adaptation, and IPCC | Listen (mp3)
  
• Martin Parry, Grantham Institute and Centre for Environmental Policy, Imperial College, UK. Martin was co-chair of the IPCC’s working group II on impacts, adaptation and vulnerability – The challenge for adaptation: the legacy from Copenhagen | Listen (mp3)
  
• Stephen Schneider, Stanford University, USA. Recognised as one of the world’s foremost experts in climate change, Stephen Schneider has served as an advisor to the Nixon, Carter, Reagan, George H. W. Bush, Clinton, George W. Bush and Obama administrations. – Uncertainty/limits to adaptation/adapting to +4°C | Listen (mp3)
  

Listen to the Q and A session here (mp3).

For further information, please contact the AusSMC on 08 7120 8666 or email AusSMC

The veracity of the claim is in doubt after it was revealed that information cited in the report was based on “grey literature”. It was taken from a WWF report that was not based on peer-reviewed research.

“We are looking at the issue and will be able to comment on the report after examining the facts. The science doesn’t change: Glaciers are melting across the globe and those in the Himalayas are no different,” Rajendra Pachauri, head of the IPCC, told Bloomberg.

Here is the actual chapter and subsection under scrutiny:

The New Zealand SMC sought comment from Dr Andrew Mackintosh, senior lecturer in geography and geology, Victoria University:

Feel free to use the quotes below in your stories. Any further comments will be posted here. If you would like to speak to an expert, please don’t hesitate to contact us on (08) 7120 8666 or by email. 

Dr Andrew Mackintosh is a senior lecturer in geography and geology at Victoria University, New Zealand

“Himalayan glaciers have been less well studied than in many areas of Earth such as the European Alps. From what we do know, the overall trend is of increasing mass loss, although this might not be true of every region.

“Satellite observations of glacier retreat in the eastern Himalaya in particular show large changes in the glaciers. Here, much like in New Zealand, many glaciers are covered by surface debris and they have been thinning vertically rather than retreating horizontally. However, these glaciers have recently began to form lakes at their fronts, and this has enhanced retreat. This is also true of the Khumba region near Mount Everest where an overall thinning is evident and lakes have increased in size during the last few decades, much like the Tasman Glacier at Mt. Cook.

“It is clear that these glaciers are retreating and the spectre of their complete loss is very real.”

This useful research presentation, recommended by Dr Mackintosh, gives in-depth information about glacier change in the Himalayas.

Dr Ian Allison is leader of the Ice, Ocean, Atmosphere and Climate Program at the Australian Government Antarctic Division and Antarctic Climate and Ecosystems CRC

“It is important to realise that there are three main IPCC Assessment reports, which are devoted to science (the “Working Group I” report, or “WG1″), impacts (“WGII”) and mitigation (“WGIII”). The error regarding Himalayan glaciers occured in the WGII (impacts) report.

“It is helpful to think of the WGI report as a description of the partially assembled “science” jigsaw and WGII as a description of another jigsaw (the “impacts” one), which is based on the science one. The impacts jigsaw is assembled by looking at the present state of the science jigsaw. Both jigsaws are incomplete and undoubtedly contain ill-fitting pieces, but each displays a coherent (although somewhat fuzzy) picture.

“The WGII error regarding Himalayan glaciers resulted from a clear misinterpretation of the “science” jigsaw obtained by looking at the science through a rather poor lens (publications which do not meet declared IPCC criteria). This in no way casts doubt on the science – the view of one piece of the science was just distorted when it was expressed in WGII.”