What well need to weather the coming change in our climate

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we have a climate emergency

we need to take action now how can we

best do this

carbon emissions have been rising

steadily

for the past 200 years since the

pre-industrial era

through the industrial revolution from

200

past per million to now having exceeded

400 parts per million

carbon dioxide co2

is the main driver of climate change the

main source of these carbon emissions

is the burning of fossil fuels we are

now burning

55 gigatonnes per annum

into the atmosphere and climate change

is happening

it’s happening very quickly the

international panel on climate change

made up with about eleven thousand

eminent scientists from around the world

and forecasting where climate change is

heading

from where i sit at murdoch university

i’ve been fortunate enough to work

closely with a number of

key climate scientists that contribute

to this great body of work

their work has informed the most recent

ipcc report

which shows that we’ve now reached one

degree c in global warming

we’re heading towards 1.5 degrees c

warming very quickly

and is having serious climate change

impacts if we reach

2 degrees celsius we’re going to have

catastrophic climate change bill

mckibben

he looked at all this climate modelling

he looked at the fossil fuel

companies their annual reports

and he compiled all of that work and he

put it down

to three numbers the first number

two degrees celsius if we reach this

we have catastrophic climate change

the second number 565 gigatons

this is how much carbon emissions we can

pour into the atmosphere

until we get to this two degrees warming

his third number

was 2795 gigatons

this is the amount of proven coal oil

and gas

reserves that the fossil fuel companies

have

this is what they want to burn

the key part of this number

is there’s five times bigger than the

565

which is all that we need to put into

the atmosphere to get to this 2 degrees

celsius

the global carbon project has also

looked at all of this modelling

and have prepared scenarios of the

future what will happen

so we know we’re already pushing above

400 parts per million now

we’ve got one degree c warming already

we’re on the way to

1.5 degrees c if we don’t stop emissions

very soon even if we stabilize now at

400 past per million

concentration of co2 in the atmosphere

we will have 0.4 metre sea level rise by

the end of this century

if we keep going and we go up to 500

parts per million

we will get to a three degree celsius

temperature rise

in the coming decades this would give us

a 0.6 metre sea level rise

around the world 900 parts per million

what will happen

this will take us up to a devastating

five degrees celsius this is the

direction we’re heading

if the fossil fuel companies are going

to burn all of those proven reserves

of all gas and coal by the end of this

century

that would give us 0.8 meter sea level

rise around the world

this is something that developing

countries

would be extremely vulnerable to in any

of these scenarios even the first one

we would see millions of people in these

developing countries

low-lying lands heading for higher

ground

so this brings me back to where we live

here in the southwest

we have a drying climate our rainfall

decline

has resulted in a 60 reduction in runoff

in the perth catchment dams in the perth

hills so we now only get

10 of our water supply

coming from these catchment dams 50

percent

is coming from massive sea water

desalination plants

at huge financial and carbon cost

forty percent of our water supply is

coming from groundwater

this is a declining resource along with

the declining rainfall

it is already over abstracted

beyond sustainable yield in the northern

suburbs

we’re even recycling our sewage and

injecting it back into the aquifer

to top up this groundwater here in

western australia in the southwest

we have many iconic ecosystems which are

under enormous threat

we have the great ningaloo reef this is

suffering some serious impacts at the

moment the rising temperatures

are also impacting sea grass meadows

like a shark bay

the heat wave and the drought in 2010

had huge impacts on penguins and there

were huge population losses of black

cockatoos

so we know the impacts here in the

southwest and they’re getting worse

so this brings me to the action we need

to take

we need to build resilience across

western australia

understand the change that’s coming

the first transformation transforming

heavy industry

we have a huge liquefied natural gas

industry

in the north of this state this has

engineering capability

and manufacturing capacity we need to

harness the wealth

that’s generated from this industry and

convert this to renewables

have a look at the uk this is a useful

model

they have their offshore oil and gas

industry

they have used that engineering know-how

and manufacturing capability

to build a really strong and growing

offshore wind farm industry

and a marine renewable sector we can

harness the wealth

from our lng industry to build a marine

renewables

tidal power and green solar hydrogen

industry

to rival the world but if that’s not

enough

we can start to build resilience at a

community level

we can build community infrastructure if

you have a look at our electricity

network

the swiss the southwest interconnected

system we now know

and actions are underway to transition

away from coal

and convert this electricity grid into

solar wind and biomass systems

this grid this new grid will need an

enormous amount of energy storage

because renewable energies are variable

so we need

energy storage to stabilize that we’re

probably going to need

something like 200 community scale

batteries across the swiss

two or three or four utility scale

batteries the big ones

that are currently being built in

adelaide these can be located where

sewer mains and power lines cross

we need to green our city we can use

the sewer mining plants powered by solar

battery systems

to produce recycled water for urban

greening

urban forestry urban agriculture

if that’s not enough then it’s back to

us

it’s back to you and i what are the

personal actions

that you and i can take look at the

solar rooftop revolution

that’s rolling out across perth at the

moment

tens of thousands of solar photovoltaic

rooftops being installed all the time

in total it’s a bigger generator than

any of the coal generators in collie

but do you know what has the potential

to reduce

emissions more than solar power

moving to a plant-based diet

using public transport riding a bike

growing food at home avoiding single-use

plastics

composting your wastes there’s so many

actions we can take

so many things we can do at a personal

level to build

our personal and local resilience change

is coming

we need to act we need to build

resilience

thank you

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you