Tim Flannery

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Lintao Zhang/Getty Images. A Chinese man and a child wearing protective masks on a bike, Beijing, China, March 27, 2020

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BEROWRA CREEK, SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA—Even before the Covid-19 pandemic, 2020 was a terrible year for Australia, and in such dark times, humor helps us cope. The triple-whammy began with an apocalypse of smoke and fire. Megafires that created their own weather converged to become the most extensive conflagration ever recorded on any continent, destroying 20 percent of the nation’s forested land. They were finally extinguished in February—by deadly flooding. Then, as the floodwaters were still receding, the Covid-19 pandemic arrived.

I’m not a great reader of the Old Testament, but after our three plagues, I consulted Exodus on the nature of the fourth disaster inflicted on the ancient Egyptians.…  Seguir leyendo »

Saeed Khan/AFP via Getty Images. Ember and thick smoke from bushfires, Braemar Bay, New South Wales, Australia, January 4, 2020

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Australia is no stranger to bushfire. In 1994, in Sydney, I lost a house to one, and in 2002, just north of Sydney, I fought off another. But I’ve never experienced anything like the current fire season before. These bushfires have been burning since September, taking lives and property across the nation, but the worst came in late December, just as families were settling into their holidays.

The high summer period between Christmas and Australia Day (January 26) is Australia’s grandes vacances. Offices close and people resort to campsites and holiday shacks on the golden, unspoiled beaches so characteristic of our country, to fish, barbeque, and let the kids run wild.…  Seguir leyendo »

USA. New Orleans, Louisiana. December 2005. Collecting fallen trees in a park.

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President Trump’s withdrawal from the Paris climate agreement is dismaying for many reasons, not least because global agreements of any sort are increasingly difficult to broker, and that makes the landmark Paris climate deal agreed to in December 2015—the first truly international climate agreement with support from all the major world powers—all the more exceptional and precious. If the Paris agreement falters and we are forced to wait another decade for a new one, even removing atmospheric greenhouse gases, in all likelihood, will not be enough. Then, we would have no way of avoiding a dangerous and increasingly unstable future.

The Paris breakthrough came after twenty-one years of negotiations under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) process, and there were many moments when a successful outcome seemed hopeless.…  Seguir leyendo »

A ‘Third Way’ to Fight Climate Change

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Two options for dealing with climate change — reducing greenhouse gas emissions through a global agreement, and geoengineering proposals such as injecting sulfur into the stratosphere — tend to dominate current thinking. But there is a “third way” that is almost entirely neglected in political negotiations and public debate. It involves capturing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and storing it or using it to create things we need. Because of the scale of the climate problem, I believe that in coming decades third-way technologies will become a major focus of activity.

Human emissions of greenhouse gases have grown so swiftly over the past decade that they’re following the worst case scenario of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.…  Seguir leyendo »

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This summer, life in Australia resembles a compulsory and very unpleasant game of Russian roulette. A pool of hot air more than 1,000 miles wide has formed across the inland. It covers much of the continent, and has proved astonishingly persistent. Periodically, low pressure systems spill the heat towards the coast, where most Australians live. At Christmas it was Perth. Then the heat struck Adelaide, followed by Tasmania, Victoria, and southern New South Wales and Canberra. Over this weekend, it's southern Queensland and northern New South Wales that look set to face the gun. And with every heatwave, the incidences of bushfires and heat-related deaths and injuries spike.…  Seguir leyendo »

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Australia is a land of dangerous creatures. Almost every year somebody is attacked by a crocodile or shark, the bodies of an unfortunate few never to be recovered, having been used to fuel the metabolism of a great predator. Although the chances of such a thing happening are small, the horrific possibility is never far from the minds of Aussies enjoying the beach or those in Australia's tropical north.

Things have not always been this way; before the 1970s attacks by crocodiles and large sharks were rare. As predator numbers increased, a spate of attacks caught Australians by surprise, and deaths occurred before precautions were taken.…  Seguir leyendo »

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The day after the great fire burned through central Victoria, I drove from Sydney to Melbourne. Smoke obscured the horizon, entering my air-conditioned car and carrying with it that distinctive scent so strongly signifying death, or, to Aboriginal people, cleansing.

It was as if a great cremation had taken place. I didn't know then how many people had died in their cars and homes, or while fleeing, but by the time I reached the scorched ground just north of Melbourne, the dreadful news was trickling in. Australia has suffered its worst recorded peacetime loss of life. And the trauma will be with us for ever.…  Seguir leyendo »