Guest Post by Willis Eschenbach
Having spent a reasonable amount of time there, I have the highest regard for Australia and Australians. In general they are good, level-headed folks.
Unfortunately, the same can’t be said for the people who wrote the Waxman-Markey website page on Australia. I discussed the first of their “Impact Zones” here, please read it for an overview of the Waxman Markey site. This thread discusses why you need to be very careful with the Waxman Markey “facts” about Australia – they bite.
Figure 1. An Australian example of what we surfers call “the man in the gray suit”.
The website says:
Drought
Global warming is a major contributor to Australian drought. Record high temperatures are increasing evaporation, damaging vegetation and reducing water for irrigation in the continent’s agricultural basin. Sustained high temperatures are as hazardous for people as they are for plants. The average annual death toll from heat waves is over 1,100 people in Australia and that number only stands to increase.
In 2006, Australia experienced its worst drought in the last millennium. The Murray-Darling River System, which produces well over half of the country’s water supply, dropped 54 percent below its record low.
BZZZZT! Bad website, no cookies! Another factual error, and another big lie.
First, the factual error. The website links the claim of the “worst drought in the last millennium” to that noted scientific journal, the Guardian newspaper. It in turn says:
Australia suffers worst drought in 1,000 years
Australia’s blistering summer has only just begun but reservoir levels are dropping fast, crop forecasts have been slashed, and great swaths of the continent are entering what scientists yesterday called a “one in a thousand years drought”.
With many regions in their fifth year of drought, the government yesterday called an emergency water summit in Canberra. The meeting between the prime minister, John Howard, and the leaders of New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia, and Queensland was told that more than half of Australia’s farmland was experiencing drought.
David Dreverman, head of the Murray-Darling river basin commission, said: “This is more typical of a one in a 1,000-year drought, or possibly even drier, than it is of a one in 100-year event.”
What’s wrong with their statement? A number of things. First, “scientists” didn’t say anything about a one in a thousand year drought. That was said by David Dreverman, who is the head of the local Murray-Darling river commission.
Second, Mr. Dreverman did not base that statement on a thousand years of drought records preserved in tree rings, or on other proxies, or on any observations at all. It was simply a mathematical estimate of what is called a “return period” based on a probability distribution, not a scientific statement of historical fact. Here is a link (PDF) to how it was calculated.
Third, his statement was only peripherally connected to the drought. He was actually talking, not about the drought, but about the return period of the flow of the Murray River.
Fourth, he either didn’t notice or didn’t want to comment on the other reasons why the Murray River is so low. Here (PDF) are some of the reasons:
So why is there less water?
The amount of water that ends up in the Murray river has changed because:
• More farm dams have reduced run-off by between 660 and 2,400 gigalitres (Gl) per year
• Groundwater pumping has reduced run-off by 327 gigalitres per year
• regrowth from the bushfires in early 2003, when over a million hectares of
native forest was burnt, could reduce run-off by 430 gigalitres by 2020
• new plantations could have further reduced inflows by 1,100-1,400 gigalitres per year
• farmers have increased the water holding capacity of their soil by adopting minimum tillage.
So that’s the factual error. The 2006 drought was serious, there’s no question about that. But there is no scientific evidence that it was the biggest drought in a thousand years. That’s just alarmist hype.
If that’s the factual error, where’s the big lie?
The big lie is that global warming is making Australia drier. Or as the website says:
Global warming is a major contributor to Australian drought. Record high temperatures are … reducing water for irrigation in the continent’s agricultural basin.
Why is that a big lie? Because Australia has has been getting wetter as the globe warmed over the last century.
How do I know that? Well, that’s what the Australian Bureau of Meteorology says. Here’s their information about Australian rainfall, from their website.
Figure 2. Changes in rainfall, Australia, 1900-2009
No sign of a problem there, rainfall is increasing. It has increased by about 80 mm (3″) over the last century. Note that (as has been true for millennia), the rainfall in Australia comes in fits and starts. It is not uncommon for a year to have twice the rain of an adjacent year.
Now I can hear you thinking “But what about the places that were hit by the drought? The Murray-Darling River basin (of “1,000 year drought” fame) and West Australia and South Australia were all hit very hard in 2006. They must be drying out.”
We are nothing if not a full service website:
Figure 3. Changes in rainfall, Murray Darling Basin
Figure 4. Changes in rainfall, South Australia.
Figure 5. Changes in rainfall, West Australia.
No reduction in rainfall there either. Yes, there was very little rainfall in 2006 in South Australia and the Murray Darling Basin and West Australia … but in all cases, there have been worse years in the historical record.
Finally, there must be some areas of Australia that are getting dryer, aren’t there? Of course. It’s a big place. Here’s an overview of the country, showing the changes since 1900:
The overwhelming majority of the country has gotten wetter. A few places have dried slightly.
SUMMARY: Their web page contains one misrepresentation of fact about droughts, and one big lie.
Misrepresentation of fact: the 2006 drought was not the biggest in a thousand years. Most places it was not even the biggest drought in the historical record.
THE BIG LIE: When you look at the full record for Australia, it is evident that as the globe warms, Australia is not drying out. It is getting wetter.
The big lie is that “global warming” is reducing the rainfall in Australia. In fact, it is increasing the rainfall … go figure.
This appeared in 2006, good picture of the Murray River in 1914.
http://www.google.co.uk/imgres?imgurl=http://www.jennifermarohasy.com/blog/archives/Dry%2520Murray%25201914%2520blog.JPG&imgrefurl=http://jennifermarohasy.com/blog/2006/08/water-in-murray-river-not-at-record-low/&usg=__qPjThczWuqvm-SO6NesQQEJU9FQ=&h=408&w=500&sz=37&hl=en&start=20&um=1&itbs=1&tbnid=2JltCByxrnsGWM:&tbnh=106&tbnw=130&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dmurray%2Briver%2Bdrought%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26tbs%3Disch:1
Yeah I have been pointing out this fact at Jo Nova and other blogs for a while. The Aussie BoM is highly selective with the truth when it comes to reporting rainfall. They tend to skirt around the fact that overall rainfall has increased nationally (as you mentioned) and focus on the areas that appear to show slight drying trends (like the SW of Western Australia).
BTW for US readers when imagining Australia think of the lower 48 states… they are about the same size. I live in Perth (San Diego on the US map) and Western Australia (WA) covers everything west of Texas (about one third of the continent). Three quarters of the population of WA is in Perth and only about half a million in the rest of the state. The nearest city is Adelaide which would be more or less where Houston is.
There is not much in between… which is why we call a section of that stretch the Nullabor (Latin for “no trees”). You don’t want to fall asleep at the wheel and fall off the Nullabor BTW cos it looks like this:
http://www.coast-accommodation.com.au/images/regions-photos/sa-great-australian-bight.jpg
and there will more than likely be a few of those chaps in the grey suits down the bottom.
PS> There is no state called “West Australia”.
Marty Singh says:
June 30, 2010 at 12:17 am
“However, saying that higher temperatures, and therefore more evaporation will make a drought worse than it otherwise was is not too much of a stretch. Although perhaps calling it a ‘major contributor’ is going too far”.
Well actually it turns out that it was a bit of a stretch.
This claim has the fingerprints of our resident alarmist David Karoly all over it.
In 2003, he brought out a paper stating “…the higher temperatures caused a marked increase in evaporation rates, which sped up the loss of soil moisture and the drying of vegetation and watercourses. This is the first drought in Australia where the impact of human-induced global warming can be clearly observed…”
Good old Karoly, blame everything on AGW.
Unfortunately for him, in 2009 Lockhart et al published a paper titled “On the recent warming in the Murray-Darling Basin: Land surface interactions misunderstood.”
(GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH LETTERS, VOL. 36, L24405, doi:10.1029/2009GL040598, 2009)
“This paper explores an alternative explanation of recent inter-annual variability and temporal trends in seasonal maximum air temperatures. First we present observations of sunshine hours (SSH) duration as an alternative explanatory variable for average maximum daily air temperature in direct comparison to average monthly rainfall. We then explore the role of elevated temperature in influencing land surface evapotranspiration.”
“On average, an extra 1.5 hours of bright sunshine, instead of the alternative cloudy conditions, provides approximately 0.32mm of additional evapotranspiration. In contrast, an increase in air temperature of 2°C causes only an additional 0.076 mm of evapotranspiration over the entire day”.
“The empirical correlations between temperature and rainfall identified by Nicholls [2003, 2004] and Karoly and Braganza [2005] are valid and statistically significant. However, to accept the correlation as the sole basis for the attribution of cause to human emissions is to implicitly assume that the correlation represents an entirely correct model of the sole driver of maximum air temperature. This is clearly not the case”.
To cut to the chase, less cloud cover equating to more sunshine hours causes 4 times more drying than an increase of 2DegC in T’s
My sister worked for the Murray river authority. There are a number of problems Australia needs to face up to;
* Growing cotton in an essentially dry continent is not a sensible use of resources.
* No matter that it is a big place Australia can only support a relatively small population. Arguably that has been just about reached and concentrating people desiring water hungry modern lifestyles into cities means a huge drain on water resources.
*As agriculture expands so does the need for water and spraying it into the air for it to evaporate does not help the overall water conservation.
*Australia is Australia not Britain or Europe with those countrys levels of natural rainfall and river systems. It needs local solutions for local problems and an aceptance that water is never likely to be plentiful.
We have some interesting records going back to the early 1800’s and they show frequent devastating drought and a general lack of water alleviated by heavy rain in other years.
Dorothea Mckellar one of Australias best loved poets summed up the sometimes savage weather and the droughts in this moving poem ‘My country’ The first verse is about England; Its a lovely poem that sums up the debate-please find the time to read it.
http://www.imagesaustralia.com/mycountry.htm
Tonyb
Excellent job, Willis. My Mum used to tell me that liars never prospered, but the CAGW lot seem to be doing okay for now but I am sure that, as she also said, “The truth will out”. You are doing a great job of laying out the truth for all to see.
My grandfather, a ‘New Australian’ who emigrated from Yorkshire to NSW in the late 19th century, was a victim of the ‘Federation Drought’. The farmland he bought and settled in the Blue Mountains had nil rainfall for almost a decade, which ended his farming career in Australia. He moved to relatively temperate New Zealand in 1900.
I was glad to see the great Federation drought brought up – the mighty Murray ran dry at its mouth at a time when no water for irrigation was being extracted from the huge Murray Darling basin which covers the whole south east of the continent.
Just read a few short stories by Henry Lawson to get a feel for just how dry this land was but 100 years ago.
Marty Singh (12:17 am) mentions evaporation, another factor in drought.
Although there appears not doubt that Australia, like the rest of the Earth, has experienced a rise in temperature as a (maybe temporary) recovery from the global LIA (the coldest prolonged episode for some thousands of years), as well as some anthropogenic effect, there doesn’t seem to be any significant increase in overall evaporation (since mid-70s), nor for individual zones except Southwestern Australia.
http://www.bom.gov.au/cgi-bin/climate/change/timeseries.cgi?graph=evap&area=aus&season=0112&ave_yr=T
‘ Sydney has just had it’s coldest low (overnight) June temperature since 1949 of 4.3C ‘.
My car told me it was still 3.0C till at least 8.30 at Westmead. It has never been wrong when checked against the car radio weather bulletins.
How many ABC weather experts does it take to work the temperature out?
Another skeptical Greenie
By Peter Taylor, author of “CHILL”
“In all of that work I managed a multi-disciplinary team of natural scientists, engineers and sociologists. I have extensive experience of how panels, committees and institutions deal with complex science and most especially where large investments are made by the science community and major policy decisions by government and industry follow the scientific recommendations. In all of this time – over 30 years, I have come to know all the tricks…….”
“This argument forms the basis of my book – which is a summary of the arguments based upon the peer-reviewed literature (something I feel well-qualified to do) and where I conclude that recent evidence shows that the IPCC has erred and is reluctant to admit its error.”
Greenie Watch
http://antigreen.blog.com/
‘ Sydney has just had it’s coldest low (overnight) June temperature since 1949 of 4.3C ‘.
My car told me it was still 3.0C till at least 8.30am at Westmead. It has never been wrong when checked against the car radio weather bulletins.
How many ABC weather experts does it take to work the temperature out?
“Drought
Global warming is a major contributor to Australian drought. Record high temperatures are increasing evaporation, damaging vegetation and reducing water for irrigation in the continent’s agricultural basin.”
LOL. What ludicrous bs.
Most drought that westerners experience is man made, is not due to warming and evaporation, but drainage. A funny thing about going overly wild in the drainage department is when it “suddenly” rains “more an usual”, especially when what they drained in the 1900-1970/80 used to be a bog or, worse, lake. Flooding ensues since the ground is still prepared to mostly hold the water instead of letting it seeping through the soil.
When one drains a patch of land it goes dry, that’s the whole point of drainage. Farmers want it dry but not too dry, right, so they drain usually too much in certain parts of the world since they lack the necessary ingredient to irrigation control–an abundance of water. Huh, maybe they need to learn to collect the water they drain away to the ocean, instead of ending up having it like Californians.
… and here I thought it was the increased “water vapor” that caused the heat that I now learn caused evaporation that makes the water go away.
Kurt Vonnegut would be proud … “Catch 22” lives on.
Patrick Davis says: (June 29, 2010 at 11:46 pm) Also, this flooding of the basin plus Lake Ayre from rains in northern NSW and Queensland is a once in 100 years event I believe.
No, Patrick. The lake has a better bloodline than that:
Recorded fillings
The old quote the whole MDB or whole of Australia trick eh? Wot rot !
http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/current/statements/scs16.pdf
I guess lowest on record in southern Australia ain’t enough !
BTW – the Lockhart et al. paper was shot to pieces for the pretentious drivel that it was
http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2010/2009GL042254.shtml
nice job. the rainfall graphs you put together are very informative. thanks
But short term weather events always prove global warming.
What they need to do is change the name from Murray River to Murray Drainage Ditch………..
Then it might be clearer……
As a resident down-under I am embarrased by the naive alarmists down here ranting on without regard to the facts. Perhaps beer reviewed science instead of peer reviewed is more appropriate in this case.
Australian weather is extremely variable and long periods of drought are usually followed by periods of flood. There are claims that the the strengthening of the southern vortex has pulled low pressure systems furter south causing the drop in rain, but much of the water in the basin comes from snow melt run-off in spring, and there is no long term trend of reduced snow.
In the past year or so, SE QLD saw it’s dam levels go from 20% to 100% after a long drought. Some alarmists claimed the drought was caused by AGW and it spelt the end of sustained habitat in this region. Now it’s like a lush Irish pasture.
The cycle continues…..
Well done, again, Willis! Nothing like prima facie evidence to overturn the lies.
Interestingly, these “public servants”, Waxman and Malarkey, and others like them, funded by the taxpayer….if they were bankers, brokers, or anything of the sort, and they lied and misrepresented to the public, they could be tried and convicted of fraud.
But for some reason, lies, misrepresentations, and fraud…are OK for politicians.
Hmm….maybe they are taking their cues from a few “scientists” like Mann, or vice versa.
Chris
Norfolk, VA, USA
tonyb says: (June 30, 2010 at 2:29 am) No matter that it is a big place Australia can only support a relatively small population.
Don’t bet your shirt on that, tonyb. When the recent green scum covering this land dries up and blows away, and the roll-up-your-sleeves blokes* can go adventuring again and marry the massive waters up the top end to the wide open spaces, you’ll see the deserts bloom and the true levels which my country can support explode.
*Gender neutral for this use here.
As usual, savethesharks cuts to the heart of the matter…
Hi Willis, you wrote, “Unfortunately, the same can’t be said for the people who wrote the Waxman-Markey website page on Australia”.
Nice post. Unfortunately we have our own share of shoddy science here in Australia. It has infested our once prestigious CSIRO. Look at the scary regional temperature charts on the following link , p14, the last one being for the Murray Darling Basin. This is from the paper “An assessment of the impact of climate change on the nature and frequency of exceptional climatic events”, Hennessey et al, July 2008. The sky’s the limit.
“Figure 8. Simulated percentage area with exceptionally hot years in the
seven regions for 1900-2040, based on 13 climate models.The red lines
are the multi-model means while the shading shows the range between
the lowest and highest 10% of model results, all smoothed by decadal
averages. Observed data (black lines) are smoothed by a 10-year moving
average”.
http://www.daff.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0007/721285/csiro-bom-report-future-droughts.pdf
You are probably aware that David Stockwell dissected this nonsense on his Niche Modeling blog, “Drought Exceptional Circumstances”. To follow this, best start here.
http://landshape.org/enm/drought-exceptional-circumstances/
@Marty
Must not increased evaporation necessarily result in increased rainfall?
Where is it dryer – the equator or the south pole?
I think it’s more than a stretch to say droughts are worsened by higher temperatures. It’s just wrong. Circulation patterns that move masses of moist air around are responsible for where and how much rain falls. Temperature merely increases or decreases the amount of moisture where higher temperatures increase it not decrease it.
Willis, thanks once again for an informative post. It is a wonderful bit of timing. You stated, “THE BIG LIE: When you look at the full record for Australia, it is evident that as the globe warms, Australia is not drying out. It is getting wetter.” I suppose, that would be true globally. They said, “Record high temperatures are increasing evaporation,……”. Apparently, they forgot the other half of the equation. Where does the H2O go when it evaporates? Sigh, was it 4th or 5th grade when we learned about the water cycle? It really does cause one to pause and wonder if they really don’t know about such things or are they being intentionally deceitful? This is just one step in debunking the myths and misinformation the alarmists are disseminating. But, we can do better! We can apply this new found knowledge of the water cycle to the silly Amazon study that’s made such waves in the alarmist world. Increased evaporation due to heat, would necessarily cause increase rainfall. Regardless of peer-review or not, the assertion regarding the Amazon are just plain wrong. Predicting where it would fall is something else, but outside of less than a week, no one else can either. Thanks again.
My soap box:
Those graphs have the look of weather pattern oscillations. The climate zones haven’t changed but the weather patterns have within the range of the climate zones referred to in each graph. That is what natural drivers will do in my opinion. And get this: human influences (like putting up tall skyscrapers in such a way to increase temps or wind, or both) can also cause weather pattern differences within a climate zone.
Change in a climate zone would mean weather parameters that consistently and over an extended period of time, go beyond the current high and low range, IE temps, precip, humidity, clear sky days, etc. Climate change has to do with range change.
Everything else, including AGW, is weather pattern variations and oscillations within the climate range zone. At issue then is what is causing weather pattern change: natural drivers, anthropogenic drivers, or some combination of the two? But climate change? Haven’t seen it yet and don’t expect to. Not even in the Arctic.
On the other hand change overs to glacial periods is climate change on steroids.