Rural NSW mayors concede they did not move quickly enough to secure their towns’ water supplies ahead of the worst drought in living memory. The state government has threatened to intervene directly in some shires to ensure water […]
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The corporate business buying farmland and water across the southern Murray-Darling plans to farm the land and says it is not a water speculator. In a year, goFARM Australia has bought over a dozen properties and their water […]
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Report advises Australia to maintain drought preparations, even in times of normal rainfall Drought is not a natural disaster and must be accepted as an enduring feature of the Australian landscape which climate change is only going to […]
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The issue of whether Australia’s current drought is caused by climate change has been seized on by some media commentators, with debate raging over a remark from eminent scientist Andy Pitman that “there is no link between climate […]
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The head of the Murray-Darling Basin Authority (MDBA) has apologised for mistakenly publishing a report that identified farms via satellite imagery. Last week, the MDBA released a statement to say it had detected 32 private dams in the […]
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There is a phrase in the novel East of Eden that springs to mind every time politicians speak of “drought-proofing” Australia: And it never failed that during the dry years the people forgot about the rich years, and […]
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Many studies have shown that conceptual hydrologic models become less reliable as the conditions they aim to simulate deviate further from the calibration conditions. Some attempts to improve model transferability under change have been published, considering options such […]
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Indian Ocean dipole events, linked to bushfires and floods, are becoming stronger and more frequent, scientists say Global heating is “supercharging” an increasingly dangerous climate mechanism in the Indian Ocean that has played a role in disasters this […]
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With projected increases in temperature in the future, the amount of water vapour that can be held at saturation increases exponentially. This increased capacity by the atmosphere to hold water (or increased vapour pressure deficit), has important implications […]
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This study presents a comprehensive investigation of historical and future changes in flood hazard based on a solid evaluation of model performance. Using a comprehensive streamflow database of more than 30,000 gauges across the globe, the study shows that […]
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Summer might be more than six weeks away, but out-of-control bushfires have already torn across parts of eastern Australia in recent days, destroying homes and threatening lives. Firefighters battle bushfires in Angourie, northern New South Wales, on September […]
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Daily water consumption has soared in south-east Queensland despite the severe drought, prompting the early rollout of water conservation campaigns. Seqwater, which manages almost 90 per cent of south-east Queensland’s water supply across 12 dams, reported that daily […]
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Efforts are underway in Menindee, in far-west New South Wales, to try to lessen the impact of conditions that are expected to bring more mass fish kills. The community is still reeling from the devastation of last summer, […]
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Groundwater is the drinking water source for more than two billion people in the world, and provides over 40% of water for irrigated agriculture. Yet in many parts of the world groundwater has become depleted or polluted, risking […]
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Australia has one of the most sophisticated water markets in the world, particularly notable for the ways in which government can return water to the environment. Water markets allow the return of this water through two main mechanisms. […]
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The level of water stored by Australia’s capital cities has steadily fallen over the last six years. They are now collectively at 54.6% of capacity – a decline of 30% from 2013. We’re going into a hot summer […]
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A grim summer is likely for the rivers of the Murray-Darling Basin and the people, flora and fauna that rely on it. Having worked for sustainable management of these rivers for decades, I fear the coming months will […]
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There is an urgent need to understand and predict how the world around us is affected by climate change and the extremes of droughts and flooding rains. The Australian Government’s National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy NCRIS addresses this […]
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Rainfall observations are important inputs for hydrometeorological applications. However, preparing a spatially and temporally consistent rainfall dataset is still a challenge because of sparse point measurements. One potentially valuable source of rainfall data with consistent spatial and temporal […]
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From 3-14 February 2020, the 2020 Australian Climate and Water Summer Institute took place at the Australian National University (ANU). The unique two-week event brought together 17 of the most talented early-career professionals, researchers and PhD students from Australia and […]
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