Guest essay by Eric Worrall

In early February Aussie Climate Scientist Mark Howden explained how Climate Change Robs Australia of Rain. In late February, Howden explained how Climate Change makes floods more likely.

Climate change robs Australia of rain

Tracey Ferrier

Published: Wednesday, 9 February 2022 7:13 PM AEDT

Vast swathes of Australia have already lost 20 per cent of their rainfall and the country’s fire risk has gone beyond worst-case scenarios developed just a few years ago, a renowned climate expert says.

Australian National University Professor Mark Howden is a vice-chair of the world’s leading authority on climate science and says despite dire, repeated warnings “our foot is not off the climate change accelerator”.

“There is no reason to feel comfortable about how fire is evolving at the moment,” the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change vice-chair said on Wednesday, during a look back at the disasters climate change fuelled last year.

He warned that without urgent action, conditions that spawned the devastating Black Summer bushfires of 2019-20 could be the new normal by the end of this decade.

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Read more: https://7news.com.au/weather/environment/climate-change-robs-australia-of-rain-c-5634883

Just a few weeks later, and Mark Howden appears to be presenting a slightly different perspective on the “settled science”.

Climate scientists warn global heating means Australia facing more catastrophic storms and floods

Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change says climate effects expected to be more severe than initially predicted

Adam Morton Climate and environment editor @adamlmorton Mon 28 Feb 2022 22.00 AEDT

Catastrophic flooding on the scale of the disaster hitting Queensland and New South Wales is becoming more likely as the planet heats due to greenhouse gas emissions, climate scientists have warned.

The latest major assessment by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) found global warming caused by humans was causing dangerous and widespread disruption, with many effects expected to be more severe than predicted.

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Prof Mark Howden, ​​vice-chair of the IPCC working group behind the report and director of the ANU Institute for Climate, Energy and Disaster Solutions, said the evidence showed “climate change impacts are here, they matter, they are mostly negative but, if implemented, adaptation can take the edge off them”.

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“It’s more likely you’re going to see this in the future with climate change because of the warmer atmosphere, and the ability to hold more moisture in the warmer atmosphere,” he said.

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Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/feb/28/climate-scientists-warn-global-heating-means-australia-facing-more-catastrophic-storms-and-floods

I know this site has a lot of climate skeptics, but I think we all need to acknowledge that climate science finally got a prediction right for once, with their prediction that when Australia is dry it is dry, except when it is wet.