From the AFR:
In a wide-ranging interview with right-wing columnist and broadcaster Andrew Bolt, due to air on television on Sunday, Mr Abbott slammed the ABC and other media organisations for suggesting this month’s bushfires were a result of climate change.
“I suppose, you might say, that they are desperate to find anything that they think might pass as ammunition for their cause,” Mr Abbott said. “But this idea that every time we have a fire or a flood it proves that climate change is real is bizarre, because since the earliest days of European settlement in Australia, we’ve had fires and floods, and we’ve had worse fires and worse floods in the past than the ones we are currently experiencing.”
I agree that using specific events to rationalise climate change is poor argument. It is the accumulation of evidence over time, in the frequency and intensity of events, that matters. Given Mr Abbott isn’t interested in engaging the debate in these terms, his response is every bit as useless as those he is attacking. That he does so with Australia’s leading climate skeptic gives it all the feel of the rhetorical echo chamber.
The long term evidence is summarised by the Climate Institute:
A summary of the report, obtained by Fairfax Media, will put further pressure on Prime Minister Tony Abbott and Environment Minister Greg Hunt, who are resisting international criticism and insisting the ferocious bushfires threatening lives and homes have no link to climate change.
”While Australia has always experienced bushfires, climate change is increasing the probability of extreme fire weather days,” the report found.”Climate change is making hot days hotter, and heatwaves more frequent and severe. Last summer, Australia experienced the hottest summer on record, and now has just had the hottest September on record.
”South-eastern Australia is experiencing a long-term drying trend. In NSW, soil moisture levels have been at record low levels now for a number of months. More intense and frequent hot weather, as well as dry conditions, increases the likelihood of extreme fire weather days.”
The 25-page report, which will be released in full in November, is being written by Professor Lesley Hughes of Macquarie University and Professor Will Steffen of the Australian National University.
They have researched 60 pieces of peer-reviewed scientific literature on climate change and fire.
