14 DAY TRIAL // Rain has finally fallen on certain eastern parts of the Australian continent; nevertheless a recent report says that the south-eastern part of the country will suffer from an increasing risk of below-average rainfall and drier conditions in the future.
The South Eastern Australian Climate Initiative (SEACI) report is called “Climate variability and change in south-eastern Australia” and it focuses on the future changes within the water resources in the south-east of the country.
It's actually a synthesis of the results of a research carried out by the Australian Department of Climate Change and Energy Efficiency, the Victorian Government Department of Sustainability and Environment, the Managing Climate Variability R&D Program, and the Murray-Darling Basin Authority.
One of the main ideas within the report is that the recent 13-year drought was the only one in Australian history to be this long, to have so much decrease in rainfall every year and even a seasonal pattern of the rainfall decline.
This dry period has affected runoff more than expected, and as Program Director, CSIRO’s Dr. David Post said, “while 2010 has brought welcome rains for much of south-eastern Australia, there is growing evidence from SEACI research that a long-term trend towards a drier climate is taking place.
“Changes to large-scale atmospheric circulation patterns are impacting on rainfall and runoff in the south-east, particularly in the southern Murray–Darling Basin and Victoria.”
“The research indicates that these changes can be linked to global warming, making it a likely contributor to the recent drought,” added Dr Post.
They are also an indicator that the overall climate change in the south-eastern part of Australia will be just like what happened with rainfall and runoff in south-west Western Australia since the 1970s.
This new report also says that natural climate variability could be a contributing factor to the rainfall and runoff decline.
“The next three years of research under Phase 2 of SEACI aim to improve our understanding of the extent to which these changes can be attributed to climate change; to improve projections of the impacts of climate change on water resources; and to advance seasonal forecasting of climate and streamflow,” Dr Post said.
The research was undertaken by CSIRO and the Bureau of Meteorology.