CSIRO Study - Australia May Be 6C Warmer By 2070 - Rain Off By 40% - AFP

[hatrack]

SYDNEY: Global warming could force temperatures in parts of Australia up by more than six degrees Celsius by 2070, the national science agency has warned. Annual rainfall in vital farming regions in this driest of all inhabited continents could drop by 40 per cent over the same period, the Commonwealth Scientific and Research Organisation (CSIRO) said in a report released yesterday.

Bushfires and intense storms will increase and pastures will become dustbowls if climate change follows its current trends, the report warned. "The CSIRO research paints a frightening picture," said New South Wales Premier Morris Iemma, whose government commissioned the report. "That's why we need a national approach to climate change."

Australia is already in the grip of the worst drought in living memory, and Iemma and the premiers of two other south-eastern states will attend an emergency drought summit with Prime Minister John Howard today. The country's most significant river system, in the south-eastern Murray-Darling Basin, could run out of water within six months after six years of drought, the government has warned. About 30 rivers and hundreds of tributaries run across the basin, which provides for about 70 per cent of Australia's irrigated farmlands.

In the face of growing public concern over the country's environmental future, Howard has abandoned his previously sceptical response to the idea that pollution is driving climate change. But he continues to refuse to ratify the Kyoto Protocol on climate change, which seeks to limit the emission of greenhouse gases blamed for global warming.

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http://www.cosmosmagazine.com/node/828

[GreenPartyVoter]

1. I predict that this will cause problems for Howard. At some point people are

going to demand responsible eladership in the face of such a catastrophe.