Australian heatwave – linked to climate change?
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The question has been asked: is Australia’s Jan-Feb 09 heatwave related to climate change. I was also interested in the effect of climate change on the Victorian Bushfires. Hottest day on record on top of driest start to the year on record, on top of longest/driest drought on record has made the eucalypts hot, dry and ready to explode. Which they duly did.
Anyway, this source (SA gov’t) calculates the Adelaide heatwave as a 1/3000 year event. Given that the climate we have has sustained humanity’s advance for 10,000 years within a narrow band, it’s not impossible that is within the confines of the max/mins for 10,000 years – possible, but not likely.
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So, Barry Brook over at Brave New Climate has calculated (in a very very good post ) that the odds of this heatwave and the March 2008 one not being linked are 1 in 1.2 MILLION. That is to say, that the chances of these two extreme heatwaves occuring with no causal link would have a probability of 1 in 1.2 million. I wouldn’t bet on those odds.
This image illustrates it nicely: very hot is the new normal.
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