How an Aussie invention could soon cut 5% of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions

Australian-designed technology will soon be responsible for 50% of all solar energy produced globally.
Glenn Hunt/AAP

Andrew Blakers, Australian National University

In the 1980s, a global race was underway: to find a more efficient way of converting energy from the sun into electricity.

Some 30 years ago, our research team at the University of New South Wales (UNSW) came up with a breakthrough, called the PERC silicon solar cell. The cells have become the most widely deployed electricity generation technology in terms of capacity added globally each year – comfortably exceeding wind, coal, gas, hydro and others.

PERC stands for Passivated Emitter and Rear Cell. By the end of this year, PERC technology will be mitigating about 1% of global greenhouse gas emissions by displacing coal burning. Assuming that its rapid growth continues, it should be reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 5% by the mid-2020s and possibly much more in later years.

The terrible bushfires in Australia this summer, enhanced by the hottest and driest year on record in 2019, underline the need for urgent reductions in greenhouse gas emissions. By far the most effective way is driving coal out of electricity systems through very rapid deployment of solar and wind.

Soon, our Aussie invention will be generating half the world’s solar power. It is a pertinent reminder of Australia’s capacity for finding transformative technical solutions to address climate change. But we need the right government support.

A solar farm near Canberra.
Lukas Coch/AAP

An Aussie invention

Solar cells convert sunlight directly into electricity without moving parts. More efficient solar cells generally produce cheaper electricity because fewer solar cells, glass covers, transport, land and support structures are needed for a given solar power output.

By the early 1980s, the best laboratory cells around the world had reached 17% efficiency. This means that 17% of the sunlight was converted to electricity, and the rest (83%) of the solar energy was lost (as heat).

During the 1980s, our research team at UNSW led by Martin Green and myself created a series of world-record-efficient silicon solar cells. We reported 18% efficiency in 1984, 19% efficiency also in 1984, and the important milestone of 20% efficiency in 1986.

In 1989 our group reported a new solar cell design called “PERC”, with a record efficiency of 22-23%.

This new, more efficient cell was better than the old ones because we eliminated some defects in the silicon crystal surface, which led to lower electronic losses. The PERC design also enabled us to capture the sunlight more effectively.

In the 1990s, further improvements to laboratory PERC cells were made at UNSW, leading to cells in the 24-25% efficiency range. The global silicon solar cell efficiency record remained at UNSW until recently.

There was a 25-year gap between development of the PERC cell and its rapid commercial adoption, which began in 2013. During this time, many people worked to adapt the PERC design to commercial production.

PERC cells are more efficient than previous commercial cells. Strong incentives for more efficient cells have recently arisen due to the continually falling share of cell costs as a proportion of total solar power system costs (including transport, land and mounting systems).

The big benefits of solar

Currently, solar power constitutes more than 40% of net new electricity generation capacity additions, with fossil, nuclear, wind, hydro and other renewables making up the balance.

Solar is growing faster than the other electricity generation technologies. Over time, as fossil-fuelled power stations are retired, solar (and wind) will dominate electricity production, with consequent large reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.

Solar power has experienced sustained rapid exponential growth over decades, while other generation technologies are currently experiencing static, falling or negligible sales.
https://www.irena.org/publications/2019/Mar/Renewable-Capacity-Statistics-2019

This year, enough PERC solar modules will be sold to generate 60-70 gigawatts of power. According to projections, PERC will reach three quarters of annual solar module sales in the mid-2020s, enough to match the generation capacity additions from all other technologies combined.

About A$50 billion worth of PERC modules have been sold to date. This is expected to reach several hundred billion Australian dollars later this decade.

Just imagine

Australian emissions (excluding those from bushfires) are falling because we are installing solar and wind four times faster per capita than the EU, US, Japan and China.

Our position as a global leader in renewables installation is uncertain because the Renewable Energy Target, which was achieved in 2019, has not been extended.

With supportive policy, such as facilitating more transmission to bring solar and wind power to the cities, Australia could greatly increase the speed at which wind and solar are deployed, yielding rapid and deep cuts at about zero-net cost.

Such policy would entail stronger and sustained government support for renewables deployment, and research and development of new technologies.

Renewables must replace polluting coal-fired power if the world is to tackle climate change.
SASCHA STEINBACH/EPA

Looking ahead

Solar energy is vast, ubiquitous and indefinitely sustainable. Simple calculations show that less than 1% of the world’s land area would be required to provide all of the world’s energy from solar power – much of it on building roofs, in deserts and floating on water bodies.

Solar systems use only very common materials (we could never run out), have minimal need for mining (about 1% of that needed for equivalent fossil or nuclear fuels), have minimal security and military risks (we will never go to war over solar access), cannot have significant accidents (unlike nuclear), and have minimal environmental impact over unlimited time scales.

Australia is making major contributions to mitigating climate change both through rapid deployment of wind and solar and technology development such as our PERC cells. But with better government support, much more can be done – quickly and at low cost.

Andrew Blakers, Professor of Engineering, Australian National University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Climate change: why Sweden’s central bank dumped Australian bonds

Sweden’s central bank ways it will no longer invest in assets from governments with large climate footprints, even if the yields were high.
Shutterstock

John Hawkins, University of Canberra

What’s happening?

Suddenly, at the level of central banks, Australia is regarded as an investment risk.

On Wednesday Martin Flodén, the deputy governor of Sweden’s central bank, announced that because Australia and Canada were “not known for good climate work”.

As a result the bank had sold its holdings of bonds issued by the Canadian province of Alberta and by the Australian states of Queensland and Western Australia.

Martin Flodén, deputy governor Sveriges Riksbank Central Bank of Sweden

Central banks normally make the news when they change their “cash rate” and households pay less (or more) on their mortgages.

But central banks such as Australia’s Reserve Bank and the European Central Bank, the People’s Bank of China and the US Federal Reserve have broader responsibilities.

They can see climate change affecting their ability to manage their economies and deliver financial stability.

There’s more to central banks than rates

Reserve Bank deputy governor Guy Debelle. Extreme events not cyclical.
DAVID MOIR/AAP

As an example, the new managing director of the International Monetary Fund Kristalina Georgieva warned last month that the necessary transition away from fossil fuels would lead to significant amounts of “stranded assets”.

Those assets will be coal mines and oil fields that become worthless, endangering the banks that have lent to develop them. More frequent floods, storms and fires will pose risks for insurance companies. Climate change will make these and other shocks more frequent and more severe.

In a speech in March the deputy governor of Australia’s Reserve Bank Guy Debelle said we needed to stop thinking of extreme events as cyclical.

We need to think in terms of trend rather than cycles in the weather. Droughts have generally been regarded (at least economically) as cyclical events that recur every so often. In contrast, climate change is a trend change. The impact of a trend is ongoing, whereas a cycle is temporary.

And he said the changes that will be imposed on us and the changes we will need might be abrupt.

The transition path to a less carbon-intensive world is clearly quite different depending on whether it is managed as a gradual process or is abrupt. The trend changes aren’t likely to be smooth. There is likely to be volatility around the trend, with the potential for damaging outcomes from spikes above the trend.

Australia’s central bank and others are going further then just responding to the impacts of climate change. They are doing their part to moderate it.

No more watching from the sidelines

Peter Zöllner of the Bank for International Settlements launched the Green Bond Fund.
BIS

Over thirty central banks (including Australia’s), and a number of financial supervisory agencies, have created a Network for Greening the Financial System.

Its purpose is to enhance the role of the financial system in mobilising finance to support the transitions that will be needed. The US Federal Reserve has not joined yet but is considering how to participate.

One of its credos is that central banks should lead by example in their own investments.

They hold and manage over A$17 trillion. That makes them enormously large investors and a huge influence on global markets.

As part of their traditional focus on the liquidity, safety and returns from assets, they are taking into account climate change in deciding how to invest.

The are increasingly putting their money into “green bonds”, which are securities whose proceeds are used to finance projects that combat climate change or the depletion of biodiversity and natural resources.

Over A$300 billion worth of green bonds were issued in 2018, with the total stock now over A$1 trillion.

Central banks are investing, and setting standards

While large, that is still less than 1% of the stock of conventional securities. It means green bonds are less liquid and have higher buying and selling costs.

It also means smaller central banks lack the skills to deal with them.

These problems have been addressed by the Bank for International Settlements, a bank owned by 60 of the central banks.

In September it launched a green bond fund that will pool investments from 140 (mostly central bank) clients.

Its products will initially be denominated in US dollars but will later also be available in euros. It will be supported by an advisory committee of the world’s top central bankers.

It is alert to the risk of “greenwashing” and will only buy bonds that comply with the International Capital Market Association’s Green Bond Principles or the Climate Bond Initiative’s Climate Bond Standard.

Launching the fund in Basel, Switzerland, the bank’s head of banking Peter Zöllner said he was

confident that, by aggregating the investment power of central banks, we can influence the behaviour of market participants and have some impact on how green investment standards develop

It’s an important role. Traditionally focused on keeping the financial system safe, our central banks are increasingly turning to using their stewardship of the financial system to keep us, and our environment, safe.

John Hawkins, Assistant professor, University of Canberra

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Why is the Australian energy regulator suing wind farms – and why now?

Samantha Hepburn, Deakin University

The Australian Energy Regulator (AER) is suing four of the wind farms involved in the 2016 South Australian blackout – run by AGL Energy, Neoen Australia, Pacific Hydro, and Tilt Renewables – alleging they breached generator performance standards and the national electricity rules.

These proceedings appear to contradict the conclusions of a 2018 report which said while the AER had found some “administrative non-compliance”, it did not intend to take formal action given the “unprecedented circumstances”.

However the AER has since said this report focused on the lead-up and aftermath of the blackout, not the event itself. The case hinges on whether the wind farms failed to provide crucial information during the blackout which hindered recovery.

In particular, the AER is arguing the software protecting the wind farms should have been able to cope with voltage disturbances and provide continuous energy supply. On the face of it, however, this will be extremely difficult to prove.

Rehashing the 2016 blackout

The 2016 South Australian blackout was triggered by a severe storm that hit the state on September 28. Tornadoes with wind speeds up to 260 km/h raced through SA, and a single-circuit 275-kilovolt transmission line was struck down.

After this, 170km away, a double-circuit 275kV transmission line was lost. This transmission damage caused the lines to trip and a series of subsequent faults resulted in six voltage dips on the South Australian grid at 4.16pm.

As the faults escalated, eight wind farms in SA had their protection settings activated. This allowed them to withstand the voltage dip by automatically reducing power. Over a period of 7 seconds, 456 megawatts of power was removed. This reduction caused an increase in power to flow through the Heywood interconnector. This in turn triggered a protection mechanism for the interconnecter that tripped it offline.

Once this happened, SA became separated from the rest of the National Energy Market (NEM), leaving far too little power to meet demand and blacking out 850,000 homes and businesses. A 2017 report found once SA was separated from the NEM, the blackout was “inevitable”.

What went wrong at the wind farms?

The question then becomes, is there any action the wind farms could reasonably have taken to stay online, thus preventing the overloading of the Heywood interconnector?

The regulator is arguing the operators should have let the market operator know they could not handle the disruption caused by the storms, so the operator could make the best decisions to keep the grid functioning.

Wind farms, like all energy generators in Australia, have a legal requirement to meet specific performance standards. If they fall short in a way that can materially harm energy security, they have a further duty to inform the operator immediately, with a plan to remedy the problem.

To determine whether a generator has complied with these risk management standards, a range of factors are considered. These include:

the technology of the plant,
whether its performance is likely to drift or degrade over a particular time frame,
experience with the particular generation technology,
the connection point arrangement that is in place. A generator will have an arrangement with a transmission network service provider (TNSP) that operates the networks that carry electricity between generators and distribution networks. TNSP’s advise the NEM of the capacity of their transmission assets so that they can be operated without being overloaded.
the risk and costs of different testing methods given the relative size of the plant.

Plenty of blame to go around

The series of events leading up to the 2016 blackout was extremely difficult to anticipate. There were many factors, and arguably all participants were involved in different ways.

The Heywood interconnector was running at full capacity at the time, so any overload may have triggered its protective mechanism.
The transmission lines were damaged by an unprecedented 263 lightning strikes in five minutes.
The market operator itself did not adopt precautionary measures such as reducing the load on the interconnector, or providing a clearer warning to electricity generators.

Bearing this in mind, the federal court will be asked to determine whether the wind farms complied with their generator performance standards and if not, whether this breach had a “material adverse effect” on power security.

This will be difficult to prove, because even if the generator standards require the wind farms to evaluate the point at which their protective triggers activated, it is unlikely the number of faults, the severity of the voltage dip, and the impact of the increased power flow on the Heywood interconnector could have been anticipated.

The idea AEMO could have prevented the blackout if the wind farms had alerted it to the disruptive potential of their protective triggers is probably a little remote.

None of the participants could have foreseen the series of interconnected events leading to the blackout. Whilst lessons can be learned, laying blame is more complex. And while compliance with standards and rules is important, in this instance, it is unlikely that it would have changed the outcome.

Samantha Hepburn, Director of the Centre for Energy and Natural Resources Law, Deakin Law School, Deakin University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Rising seas threaten Australia’s major airports – and it may be happening faster than we think

Sydney’s airport is one of the most vulnerable in Australia to sea level rise.
Shutterstock

Thomas Mortlock, Macquarie University; Andrew Gissing, Macquarie University; Ian Goodwin, Macquarie University, and Mingzhu Wang

Most major airports in Australia are located on reclaimed swamps, sitting only a few metres above the present day sea level. And the risk of sea level rise from climate change poses a greater threat to our airports than we’re prepared for.

In fact, some of the top climate scientists now believe global sea-level rise of over two metres by 2100 is likely under our current trajectory of high carbon emissions.

This makes Cairns (less than 3m above sea level), Sydney and Brisbane (under 4m), and Townsville and Hobart (both around under 5m) airports among the most vulnerable.

Antarctica’s ice sheets could be melting faster than we think.
Tanya Patrick/CSIRO science image, CC BY

In the US, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has recommended that global mean sea level rise of up to 2.7 metres this century should be considered in planning for coastal infrastructure.

This is two to three times greater than the upper limit of recommended sea level rise projections applied in Australia.

But generally, the amount of sea level rise we can expect over the coming century is deeply uncertain. This is because ice sheet retreat rates from global warming are unpredictable.

Given the significant disruption cost and deep uncertainty associated with the timing of sea level rise, we must adopt a risk-based approach which considers extreme sea level rise scenarios as part of coastal infrastructure planning.

Are we prepared?

As polar ocean waters warm, they can cause glaciers to melt from beneath, leading to more icebergs breaking off into the ocean and then a rapid rise in global sea level. This has happened multiple times in the Earth’s past and, on some occasions, in a matter of decades.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) puts sea level rise projections for Australia somewhere between 50 to 90 centimetres by 2090, relative to the average sea level measured between 1986 to 2005. But the emerging science indicates this may now be an underestimate.

Some studies suggest if substantive glacial basins of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet were to collapse, it could contribute at least a further two metres to global sea levels.

Most Australian airports have conducted risk assessments for the IPCC projections.

In fact, there is no state-level policy that considers extreme sea level rise for the most critical infrastructure, even though it is possible sea levels could exceed those recommended by the IPCC within the coming century.

And for airports, the planning implications are stark when you compare the current projection of less than a metre of sea level rise and the potential of at least a two metre rise later this century.

Taking the most low-lying major airports in Australia as an example, our modelling suggests a collapse of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet would see their near complete inundation – without any adaptation in place.

For more elevated locations, coastal infrastructure may still be inoperable more frequently when the combined effect of storm surges, waves, elevated groundwater or river flooding are considered.

A $200 billion problem

Our airports and other forms of infrastructure near the coastline are critical to the Australian economy. The aviation industry has an estimated annual revenue of over A$43 billion, adding around A$16 billion to the economy in 2017.

While there are many uncertainties around the future cost of sea-level rise, a study by the Climate Council suggests over a metre sea level rise would put more than A$200 billion worth of Australian infrastructure at risk.

It is difficult to assign a probability and time-frame to ice sheet collapse, but scientific estimates are reducing that time frame to a century rather than a millennium.

Uncertainty generally comes with a cost, so proactive planning would make economic sense.

Adapting our most critical coastal assets while sea levels rapidly rise is not an option – mitigation infrastructure could take decades to construct and may be prohibitively expensive.

Given the deep uncertainties associated with the timing of ice-sheet collapse, we suggest airport and other critical coastal infrastructure is subjected to risk analysis for a two to three metre sea level rise.

Thomas Mortlock, Senior Risk Scientist, Risk Frontiers, Adjunct Fellow, Macquarie University; Andrew Gissing, General Manager, Risk Frontiers, Adjunct Fellow, Macquarie University; Ian Goodwin, Associate Professor, Macquarie University, and Mingzhu Wang, Senior Geospatial Scientist, Risk Frontiers, Adjunct Fellow, Macquarie University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

The dingo is a true-blue, native Australian species

Bradley Smith, CQUniversity Australia; Corey J. A. Bradshaw, Flinders University; Euan Ritchie, Deakin University; Justin W. Adams, Monash University; Kylie M Cairns, UNSW, and Mathew Crowther, University of Sydney

Of all Australia’s wildlife, one stands out as having an identity crisis: the dingo. But our recent article in the journal Zootaxa argues that dingoes should be regarded as a bona fide species on multiple fronts.

This isn’t just an issue of semantics. How someone refers to dingoes may reflect their values and interests, as much as the science.

How scientists refer to dingoes in print reflects their background and place of employment, and the Western Australian government recently made a controversial attempt to classify the dingo as “non-native fauna”.

How we define species – called taxonomy – affects our attitudes, and long-term goals for their conservation.

What is a dog?

Over many years, dingoes have been called many scientific names: Canis lupus dingo (a subspecies of the wolf), Canis familiaris (a domestic dog), and Canis dingo (its own species within the genus Canis). But these names have been applied inconsistently in both academic literature and government policy.

This inconsistency partially reflects the global arguments regarding the naming of canids. For those who adhere to the traditional “biological” species concept (in which a “species” is a group of organisms that can interbreed), one might consider the dingo (and all other canids that can interbreed, like wolves, coyotes, and black-backed jackals) to be part of a single, highly variable and widely distributed species.

Members of the *Canis* genus: wolf (*Canis lupus*), coyote (*Canis latrans*), Ethiopian wolf (*Canis simensis*), black-backed jackal (*Canis mesomelas*), dingo (*Canis dingo*), and a representative of the domestic dog (*Canis familiaris*).

But the “biological” species concept used to name species came about long before modern genetic tools, or even before many hybrid species were identified by their DNA (such as the “red wolf,” an ancient hybrid of grey wolves and coyotes found in the southeastern United States).

Few people would really argue that a chihuahua, a wolf, and a coyote are the same species. In reality there are many more comprehensive and logical ways to classify a species. In our latest paper we argue that a holistic approach to defining species is essential in the case of the dingo and other canids.

Our work shows conclusively that dingoes are distinct from wild canids and domestic dogs based on many different criteria.

Truly wild

The first criterion is that dingoes are wild animals, and live completely independent from humans. This is fundamentally different to domestic, feral, or wild dogs, which must live near human settlements and rely on humans for food and water in some way to survive.

Yes, the dingo might have arrived in Australia with humans, and we know that Aboriginal Australians have had a close relationship with dingoes following the latter’s arrival. But neither of these observations excludes dingoes from being wild.

For example, a relationship with humans does not constitute the rigorous definitions of domestication. Consider the red fox (Vulpes vulpes), which was also introduced to Australia by people and are now free-ranging: they are also not considered to be domesticated. Neither are wild animals such as birds that we feed in our backyards domesticated simply because they are sometimes fed by us.

Ecological role

In fact, dingoes have been living wild and independently of humans for a very long time — they have a distinct and unique evolutionary past that diverged some 5 to 10 thousand years ago from other canids. This is more than enough time for the dingo to have evolved into a naturalised predator now integral to maintaining the health of many Australian ecosystems.

Dogs do not have the brain power or body adaptations to survive in the wild, and they cannot play the same ecological role as dingoes. From this ecological perspective alone, the two species are not interchangeable. Dingoes are Australia’s only large (between 15-20 kg), land-based predator, and as such play a vital role in Australia’s environment.

Shape and size

Viewed alone, the overall shape of the body and skull does not easily distinguish wild canids from dogs, mainly because of the sheer diversity among different breeds of domestic dogs.

But there are some important body differences between free-ranging dogs and dingoes, mainly in the skull region (as shown here and here).

Cranial 3-D reconstructions of a dingo (bottom) and a free-ranging dog (top), highlighting the differences in cranial morphology mentioned in the text.

Behaviour

Dingoes (and other truly wild canids) have some fundamentally unique behaviours that set them apart from dogs (although like shape, there are often exceptions among the artificial dog breeds). For example, dingoes have significantly different reproductive biology and care-giving strategies.

There are also differences in brain function, such as in the way the two species solve problems, and dingoes and dogs communicate differently with humans.

Genetics

While dingoes and dogs obviously share an ancestral relationship, there is a lot of genetic data to support the distinction between dingoes and dogs.

While dingoes share ancestry with ancient Asian dogs from 10,000 years ago, the dingo has been geographically isolated from all other canids for many thousands of years, and genetic mixing has only been occurring recently, most probably driven by human intervention.

Since the 1990s, genetic markers have been in widespread use by land managers, conservation groups, and researchers to differentiate dingoes from domestic dogs.

A summary of the evolutionary relationships among wolves, dingoes and modern domestic dogs. Dingoes and other ancient lineages of dog such as New Guinea singing dogs form a distinct lineage separate from modern domestic dogs that have undergone successive generations of artificial selection.

What’s at stake?

Even acknowledging the dingo’s uncertain and distant past, lumping dingoes and dogs together is unjustified.

Labelling dingoes as “feral domestic dogs” or some other misnomer ignores their unique, long, and quintessentially wild history in Australia.

Inappropriate naming also has serious implications for their treatment. Any label less than “dingo” can be used to justify their legal persecution.

Further loss of dingoes could have serious, negative ecological consequences, including potentially placing other Australian native animals at increased risk of extinction.

Bradley Smith, Senior Lecturer in Psychology, CQUniversity Australia; Corey J. A. Bradshaw, Matthew Flinders Fellow in Global Ecology, Flinders University; Euan Ritchie, Associate Professor in Wildlife Ecology and Conservation, Centre for Integrative Ecology, School of Life & Environmental Sciences, Deakin University; Justin W. Adams, Senior Lecturer, Department of Anatomy and Developmental Biology, Monash University; Kylie M Cairns, Adjunct associate lecturer, UNSW, and Mathew Crowther, Associate professor, University of Sydney

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

For the first time we’ve looked at every threatened bird in Australia side-by-side

File 20181126 140522 1v2gsvv.jpg?ixlib=rb 1.1 — Success with conservation of Kangaroo Island’s Glossy Black-Cockatoos can now be compared with other bird conservation efforts around the country.
Ian Sanderson/Flickr, CC BY-NC-SA

Stephen Garnett, Charles Darwin University; Alienor Chauvenet, Griffith University; April Reside, The University of Queensland; Brendan Wintle, University of Melbourne; David Lindenmayer, Australian National University; David M Watson, Charles Sturt University; Elisa Bayraktarov, The University of Queensland; Hayley Geyle, Charles Darwin University; Hugh Possingham, The University of Queensland; Ian Leiper, Charles Darwin University; James Watson, The University of Queensland; Jim Radford, La Trobe University; John Woinarski, Charles Darwin University; Les Christidis, Southern Cross University; Martine Maron, The University of Queensland; Molly K Grace, University of Oxford; Paul McDonald, University of New England, and Sarah Legge, Australian National University

Glossy Black-Cockatoos used to be common on South Australia’s Kangaroo Island until possums started eating their eggs and chicks. After volunteers helped protect nest hollows and erect safe nest boxes, the population more than doubled.

But how do you measure such success? How do you compare cockatoo nest protection with any other investment in conservation?

Unfortunately, we have few ways to compare and track the different efforts many people may be making to help conserve our natural treasures.

That’s why a group of us from a dozen Australian universities along with scientists and private researchers around the world have created metrics of progress for both our understanding of how to manage threats of different intensity, and how well that management has been implemented. We also provide guidance on what still needs doing before a threat no longer needs active management.

For the first time, we looked at every threatened bird in Australia to see how well – or not – they are managed. Hopefully, we can use this to avoid compounding our disastrous recent track record of extinctions in Australia.

The state of Australian birds

What we did differently was collect the same data across different species, which meant we could compare conservation efforts across all bids.

The mallee emu-wren is unique to Australia and endangered due to habitat loss.
Nik Borrow/Flickr

When we applied these metrics to Australia’s 238 threatened bird species, the results were both encouraging and daunting. The good news is that we understand how to reduce the impact of about 52% of the threats – although of course that means we know little about how to deal with the other 48%.

But the situation is decidedly worse when we consider how effectively we are putting that research into practice. Only 43% of threats are being managed in any way at all – and just a third of the worst threats – and we are achieving good outcomes for just 20%.

But at least we now know where we are. We can celebrate what we have accomplished, appreciate how much needs doing, and direct our efforts where they will have the greatest benefit.

The threats to our birds

Introduced mammals, particularly cats, have been (and continue to be) a significant threat to Australian birds. Although we have successfully eradicated feral animals on many islands, saving many species, they remain a grave threat on the mainland.

The effect of climate change is becoming the top priority threat for the future. About half of all threatened birds are likely to be affected by increases in drought, fire, heat or sea level. Given the policy prevarication at a global level, targeted research is essential if birds are to be helped to cope.

By looking at multiple species, we can also identify what helps successful conservation. Monitoring, for instance, has a big impact on threat alleviation – better monitored species receive more attention.

The orange-bellied parrot is amongst Australia’s most critically endangered birds.
sompreaw/Shutterstock

There is also – unsurprisingly – a strong connection between knowledge of how to manage a threat and successful application of that knowledge. Often policy people want instant action, but our work suggests that action before knowledge will squander money.

Where to from here?

So what can we use this analysis for? One use is helping species close to extinction.

Using the same approach for multiple species groups, it is apparent that, while birds and mammals are in a parlous state, the most threatened fish are far worse off. We can also identify some clear priorities for action.

Finally, we must acknowledge this work emerged not from a government research grant, but from a non-government organisation (NGO). BirdLife Australia needed an overview of the country’s performance with threatened birds and was able to draw on the volunteered skills of biologists and mathematicians from around the country, and then the world.

Indeed, one of the future projects will be using the new assessment tool to see just how much of the conservation action around the country is being driven by volunteers, from the many people who contributed their knowledge and skills to this paper through to those keeping glossy black-cockatoo chicks safe on Kangaroo Island.

Stephen Garnett, Professor of Conservation and Sustainable Livelihoods, Charles Darwin University; Alienor Chauvenet, Lecturer, Griffith University; April Reside, Researcher, Centre for Biodiversity and Conservation Science, The University of Queensland; Brendan Wintle, Professor Conservation Ecology, University of Melbourne; David Lindenmayer, Professor, The Fenner School of Environment and Society, Australian National University; David M Watson, Professor in Ecology, Charles Sturt University; Elisa Bayraktarov, Postdoctoral Research Fellow in Conservation Biology, The University of Queensland; Hayley Geyle, Research Assistant, Charles Darwin University; Hugh Possingham, Professor, The University of Queensland; Ian Leiper, Geospatial Scientist, Charles Darwin University; James Watson, Professor, The University of Queensland; Jim Radford, Principal Research Fellow, Research Centre for Future Landscapes, La Trobe University; John Woinarski, Professor (conservation biology), Charles Darwin University; Les Christidis, Professor, Southern Cross University; Martine Maron, ARC Future Fellow and Associate Professor of Environmental Management, The University of Queensland; Molly K Grace, Postdoctoral Fellow in Zoology, University of Oxford; Paul McDonald, Associate professor, University of New England, and Sarah Legge, Associate Professor, Australian National University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

We need more carbon in our soil to help Australian farmers through the drought

File 20181011 72127 z4wp9y.jpg?ixlib=rb 1.1 — Healthy soils can hold water even during droughts.
Evie Shaffer/Unsplash

Nanthi Bolan, University of Newcastle

Australia has never been a stranger to droughts, but climate change is now super-charging them.

Besides taking a toll on human health, droughts also bake the earth. This means the ground holds less water, creating a vicious cycle of dryness.

Our research has investigated ways to improve the health and structure of soil so it can hold more water, even during droughts. It’s vital to help farmers safeguard their soil as we adapt to an increasingly drought-prone climate.

Soil moisture is key

The immediate effect of drought is complete loss of soil water. Low moisture reduces soil health and productivity, and increases the loss of fertile top soil through wind and water erosion.

To describe how we can improve soil health, we first need to explain some technical aspects of soil moisture.

Soil with good structure tends to hold moisture, protecting soil health and agricultural productivity.
Author provided

Soil moisture is dictated by three factors: the ability of the soil to absorb water; its capacity to store that water; and the speed at which the water is lost through evaporation and runoff, or used by growing plants.

These three factors are primarily determined by the proportions of sand, silt and clay; together these create the “soil structure”. The right mixture means there are plenty of “pores” – small open spaces in the soil.

Soils dominated by very small “micropores” (30-75 micrometres), such as clay soil, tend to store more water than those dominated by macropores (more than 75 micrometers), such as sandy soil.

If the balance is skewed, soil can actually repel water, increasing runoff. This is a major concern in Australia, especially in some areas of Western Australia and South Australia.

Improving soil structure

Good soil structure essentially means it can hold more water for longer (other factors include compaction and surface crust).

Farmers can improve soil structure by using minimum tillage, crop rotation and return of crop residues after harvest.

Another important part of the puzzle is the amount of organic matter in the soil –it breaks down into carbon and nutrients, which is essential for absorbing and storing water.

There are three basic ways to increase the amount of organic matter a given area:

grow more plants in that spot, and leave the crop and root residue after harvest
slow down decomposition by tilling less and generally not disturbing the soil more than absolutely necessary
apply external organic matter through compost, mulch, biochar and biosolids (treated sewage sludge).

Typically, biosolids are used to give nutrients to the soil, but we researched its impact on carbon storage as well. When we visited a young farmer in Orange, NSW, he showed us two sites: one with biosolids, and one without. The site with biosolids grew a bumper crop of maize the farmer could use as fodder for his cattle; the field without it was stunted.

The farmer told us the extra carbon had captured more moisture, which meant strong seedling growth and a useful crop.

This illustrates the value of biowastes including compost, manure, crop residues and biosolids in capturing and retaining moisture for crop growth, reducing the impact of drought on soil health and productivity.

Improving soil health cannot happen overnight, and it’s difficult to achieve while in midst of a drought. But how farmers manage their soil in the good times can help prepare them for managing the impacts of the next drought when it invariably comes.

The author would like to thank Dr Michael Crawford, CEO of Soil CRC, for his substantial contribution to this article.

Nanthi Bolan, Professor of Enviornmental Science, University of Newcastle

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Lack of climate policy threatens to trip up Australian diplomacy this summit season

File 20180907 190656 1qu49hy.jpg?ixlib=rb 1.1 — Australia’s climate stance risks its standing on the world stage.
Shutterstock.com

Christian Downie, Australian National University

Australia has navigated a somewhat stormy passage through the Pacific Islands Forum in Nauru. Scott Morrison’s new-look government faced renewed accusations at the summit about the strength of Australia’s resolve on climate policy.

Australia is neither a small nation nor one of the most powerful, but for many years it has been a trusted nation. Historically, Australia has been seen as a good international citizen, a country that stands by its international commitments and works with others to improve the international system, not undermine it.

But in recent years climate change has threatened this reputation. This is
especially so among our allies and neighbours in the Pacific region, who attended this week’s Nauru summit.

With Australia’s new foreign minister, Marise Payne, attending instead of
the prime minister – not a good look, albeit understandable in the circumstances –
the government came under yet more international pressure to state plainly its commitment to the Paris climate agreement.

Pacific nations may be divided on many issues, but climate change is rarely one of them.

Before the meeting, Pacific leaders urged Australia to sign a pledge of support for the agreement and to declare climate change “the single greatest threat to the livelihoods, security and wellbeing” of the region.

Australia ultimately signed the pledge, but also reportedly resisted a push for the summit’s communique to include stronger calls for the world to pursue the Paris Agreement’s more ambitious goal of limiting global warming to 1.5℃.

The government now has a chance to catch its breath before international summit season begins in earnest in November with the East Asia Summit in Singapore, followed quickly by APEC in Papua New Guinea and then the G20 summit in Buenos Aires on November 30 and December 1, not to mention the next round of UN climate negotiations in Poland in December.

The G20 is arguably the most important summit, bringing together the leaders of the 20 most powerful nations in the world. It is a forum at which Australia’s
position on the climate issue has already suffered significant diplomatic damage under the Coalition government.

When Australia hosted the G20 Brisbane talks in 2014, the then prime minister, Tony Abbott, worked to keep climate change off the formal agenda. Stiff opposition from several of Australia’s allies forced him to back down.

Other nations will be wary of Australia’s stance at the G20 this time around,
especially following the leadership turmoil in Canberra.

Indeed, with climate policy continuing to divide the Coalition, there is a
significant risk that further missteps on climate change will undermine Australia’s international standing.

A better option

It doesn’t have to be this way. Australia could easily meet its Paris target of cutting emissions to 26-28% below 2005 levels by 2030 with a national climate and energy strategy. But right now Australia is without one, and with Malcolm Turnbull’s passing as prime minister and the demise of the National Energy Guarantee, it looks unlikely to have a strategy in place by the time the G20 rolls around in November.

Australia’s overall greenhouse emissions have been rising for several years now, and many independent projections have Australia overshooting what is in reality a modest target.

But, rather than rectifying the situation, Morrison and his new cabinet have yet to make it completely clear whether Australia will stand by the Paris Agreement at all.

Even if the scenario of a US-style pullout is avoided, Morrison will face mounting pressure from the vocal band of conservatives in his party room not to commit to anything on climate change, be it symbolic or tangible.

What the government chooses to do next could have reputational repercussions for years to come.

Australia may not have the might of other nations, but what it has had at times is a reputation as a constructive international partner. This needs to be restored if Australian diplomats are to successfully navigate a disruptive international landscape.

Climate policy is clearly a threat to our domestic politics and to the job security of Australian prime ministers. With further missteps it could upend our diplomacy as well. Summit season will go a long way towards determining how much of a threat it really is.

Christian Downie, Australian Research Council DECRA Fellow, Australian National University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Cape Town is almost out of water. Could Australian cities suffer the same fate?

Ian Wright, Western Sydney University

The world is watching the unfolding Cape Town water crisis with horror. On “Day Zero”, now predicted to be just ten weeks away, engineers will turn off the water supply. The South African city’s four million residents will have to queue at one of 200 water collection points.

Cape Town is the first major city to face such an extreme water crisis. There are so many unanswered questions. How will the sick or elderly people cope? How will people without a car collect their 25-litre daily ration? Pity those collecting water for a big family.

The crisis is caused by a combination of factors. First of all, Cape Town has a very dry climate with annual rainfall of 515mm. Since 2015, it has been in a drought estimated to be a one-in-300-year event.

In recent years, the city’s population has grown rapidly – by 79% since 1995. Many have questioned what Cape Town has done to expand the city’s water supply to cater for the population growth and the lower rainfall.

Could this happen in Australia?

Australia’s largest cities have often struggled with drought. Water supplies may decline further due to climate change and uncertain future rainfall. With all capital cities expecting further population growth, this could cause water supply crises.

The situation in Cape Town has strong parallels with Perth in Australia. Perth is half the size of Cape Town, with two million residents, but has endured increasing water stress for nearly 50 years. From 1911 to 1974, the annual inflow to Perth’s water reservoirs averaged 338 gigalitres (GL) a year. Inflows have since shrunk by nearly 90% to just 42GL a year from 2010-2016.

To make matters worse, the Perth water storages also had to supply more people. Australia’s fourth-largest city had the fastest capital city population growth, 28.2%, from 2006-2016.

As a result, Perth became Australia’s first capital city unable to supply its residents from storage dams fed by rainfall and river flows. In 2015 the city faced a potentially disastrous situation. River inflows to Perth’s dams dwindled to 11.4GL for the year.

For its two million people, the inflows equated to only 15.6 litres per person per day! Yet in 2015/6 Perth residents consumed an average of nearly 350 litres each per day. This was the highest daily water consumption for Australia’s capitals. How was this achieved?

Tapping into desalination and groundwater

Perth has progressively sourced more and more of its supply from desalination and from groundwater extraction. This has been expensive and has been the topic of much debate. Perth is the only Australian capital to rely so heavily on desalination and groundwater for its water supply.

Volumes of water sourced for urban use in Australia’s major cities.
BOM, Water in Australia, p.52, National Water Account 2015, CC BY

Australia’s next most water-stressed capital is Adelaide. That city is supplementing its surface water storages with desalination and groundwater, as well as water “transferred” from the Murray River.

Australia’s other capital cities on the east coast have faced their own water supply crises. Their water storages dwindled to between 20% and 35% capacity in 2007. This triggered multiple actions to prevent a water crisis. Progressively tighter water restrictions were declared.

The major population centres (Brisbane/Gold Coast, Sydney, Melbourne and Adelaide) also built large desalination plants. The community reaction to the desalination plants was mixed. While some welcomed these, others question their costs and environmental impacts.

The desalination plants were expensive to build, consume vast quantities of electricity and are very expensive to run. They remain costly to maintain, even if they do not supply desalinated water. All residents pay higher water rates as a result of their existence.

Since then, rainfall in southeastern Australia has increased and water storages have refilled. The largest southeastern Australia desalination plants have been placed on “stand-by” mode. They will be switched on if and when the supply level drops.

Investing in huge storage capacity

Many Australian cities also store very large volumes of water in very large water reservoirs. This allows them to continue to supply water through future extended periods of dry weather.

The three largest cities (Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane) have built very large dams indeed. For example, Brisbane has 2,220,150 ML storage capacity for its 2.2 million residents. That amounts to just over one million litres per resident when storages are full.

In comparison, Cape Town’s four million residents have a full storage capacity of 900,000 ML. That’s 225,000 litres per resident. Cape Town is constructing a number of small desalination plants while anxiously waiting for the onset of the region’s formerly regular winter rains.

Ian Wright, Senior Lecturer in Environmental Science, Western Sydney University

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

For whom the bell tolls: cats kill more than a million Australian birds every day

File 20171003 12149 22qzom — On the prowl in the outback.
Hugh McGregor/Arid Recovery, Author provided

John Woinarski, Charles Darwin University; Brett Murphy, Charles Darwin University; Leigh-Ann Woolley, Charles Darwin University; Sarah Legge, Australian National University; Stephen Garnett, Charles Darwin University, and Tim Doherty, Deakin University

Cats kill more than a million birds every day across Australia, according to our new estimate – the first robust attempt to quantify the problem on a nationwide scale.

By combining data on the cat population, hunting rates and spatial distribution, we calculate that they kill 377 million birds a year. Rates are highest in Australia’s dry interior, suggesting that feral cats pose a serious and largely unseen threat to native bird species.

This has been a contentious issue for more than 100 years, since the spread of feral cats encompassed the entire Australian mainland. In 1906 the ornithologist A.J. Campbell noted that the arrival of feral cats in a location often immediately preceded the decline of many native bird species, and he campaigned vigorously for action:

Undoubtedly, if many of our highly interesting and beautiful birds, especially ground-loving species, are to be preserved from total extinction, we must as a bird-lovers’ union, at no distant date face squarely a wildcat destruction scheme.

His call produced little response, and there has been no successful and enduring reduction in cat numbers since. Nor, until now, has there been a concerted effort to find out exactly how many birds are being killed by cats.

Counting the cost

To provide a first national assessment of the toll taken by cats on Australian birds, we have compiled almost 100 studies detailing the diets of Australia’s feral cats. The results show that the average feral cat eats about two birds every five days.

We then combined these statistics with information about the population density of feral cats, to create a map of the estimated rates of birds killed by cats throughout Australia.

Number of birds eaten per square kilometre.
Brett Murphy, Author provided

We conclude that, on average, feral cats in Australia’s largely natural landscapes kill 272 million birds per year. Bird-kill rates are highest in arid Australia (up to 330 birds per square km per year) and on islands, where rates can vary greatly depending on size.

We also estimate (albeit with fewer data) that feral cats in human-modified landscapes, such as the areas surrounding cities, kill a further 44 million birds each year. Pet cats, meanwhile, kill about 61 million birds per year.

Overall, this amounts to more than 377 million birds killed by cats per year in Australia – more than a million every day.

Which species are suffering?

In a related study, we also compiled records of the bird species being killed by cats in Australia. We found records of cats killing more than 330 native bird species – about half of all Australia’s resident bird species. In natural and remote landscapes, 99% of the cat-killed birds are native species. Our results also show that cats are known to kill 71 of Australia’s 117 threatened bird species.

Birds that feed or nest on the ground, live on islands, and are medium-sized (60-300g) are most likely to be killed by cats.

Galahs are among the many native species being killed by feral cats.
Mark Marathon, Author provided

It is difficult to put a million-plus daily bird deaths in context without a reliable estimate of the total number of birds in Australia. But our coarse assessment from many published estimates of local bird density suggests that there are about 11 billion land birds in Australia,
suggesting that cats kill about 3-4% of Australia’s birds each year.

However, particular species are hit much harder than others, and the population viability of some species (such as quail-thrushes, button-quails and ground-feeding pigeons and doves) is likely to be especially threatened.

Our tally of bird deaths is comparable to similar estimates for other countries. Our figure is lower than a recent estimate for the United States, and slightly higher than in Canada. Overall, bird killings by cats seem to greatly outnumber those caused by humans.

In Australia, cats are likely to significantly increase the extinction risk faced by some bird species. In many locations, birds face a range of interacting threats, with cat abundance and hunting success shown to increase in fragmented bushland, in areas with high stocking rates, and in places with poorly managed fire regimes, so cat impacts compound these other threats.

Belling the cat

What can be done to reduce the impact? The federal government’s Threatened Species Strategy recognises the threat posed by feral cats, albeit mainly on the basis of their role in mammal extinctions.

The threatened species strategy also prioritised efforts to control feral cats more intensively, eradicate them from islands with important biodiversity values, and to expand a national network of fenced areas that excludes feral cats and foxes.

But while fences can create important havens for many threatened mammals, they are much less effective for protecting birds. To save birds, cats will need to be controlled on a much broader scale.

We should also remember that this is not just a remote bush problem. Roughly half of Australia’s cats are pets, and they also take a considerable toll on wildlife.

While recognising the many benefits of pet ownership, we should also work to reduce the detrimental impacts. Fortunately, there is increasing public awareness of the benefits of not letting pet cats roam freely. With such measures, cat owners can help to look after the birds in their own backyards, and hence contribute to conserving Australia’s unique wildlife.

We acknowledge the contribution of Russell Palmer (WA Department of Biodiversity Conservation and Attractions), Chris Dickman (University of Sydney), David Paton (University of Adelaide), Alex Nankivell (Nature Foundation SA Inc.), Mike Lawes (University of KwaZulu-Natal), and Glenn Edwards (Department of Environment and Natural Resources) to this article.

John Woinarski, Professor (conservation biology), Charles Darwin University; Brett Murphy, Senior Research Fellow, Charles Darwin University; Leigh-Ann Woolley, Research Associate, Charles Darwin University; Sarah Legge, Associate Professor, Australian National University; Stephen Garnett, Professor of Conservation and Sustainable Livelihoods, Charles Darwin University, and Tim Doherty, Research Fellow, Deakin University

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

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The state of Australian birds

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Soil moisture is key

Improving soil structure

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A better option

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Could this happen in Australia?

Tapping into desalination and groundwater

Investing in huge storage capacity

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Counting the cost

Which species are suffering?

Belling the cat

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