Wildfires are the new “polar bear”, routinely used by the media to epitomise the climate crisis and the threat of major natural hazards. This is despite most fire on Earth being harmless, even ecologically beneficial.

But are wildfires really getting more extreme? Climate sceptics have challenged this claim. They point to a global decline in the area burned and argue the attention given to wildfire is a distracting form of media confirmation bias.

Importantly, not all fire is equal. Most fires are small. Others release enormous amounts of energy. Energetically extreme fires have an outsized impact on the Earth system, injecting vast smoke plumes into the atmosphere comparable to volcanic eruptions. They release huge stores of carbon and cause major damage to ecosystems and societies, sometimes obliterating entire towns or suburbs.

So are these extreme fires getting worse? Yes they are, as our new research, published in the journal Nature Ecology and Evolution, shows. We chart the rapid growth of energetically extreme wildfires across the planet over the past two decades.

Extreme fires are on the rise

We analysed 88 million observations of wildfire from NASA’s MODIS satellites. These satellites pass overhead several times a day. They record fires and the energy they release – known as fire radiative power.

Using this 21-year dataset, we identified energetically extreme fires, defined as the top 0.01% for fire radiative power. Our findings conclusively show there has been a strong upward trend in extreme fire events over the past two decades. Their frequency and intensity more than doubled from 2003 to 2023.

The past seven years included the six most extreme in the 21-year period. This increase occurred in lockstep with global heating, with 2023 smashing temperature records and also having the most intense fires.

Northern hemisphere and Australia hit hard

The fastest increases were in the temperate conifer forest and carbon-rich boreal forest of the northern hemisphere. Recent fires there have released immense amounts of smoke and carbon, threatening to intensify warming.

Last year, extreme fires in Canada blanketed tens of millions of people in the eastern United States in smoke. The fires resulted in dangerous air quality, which is a bigger killer than the flames themselves.

While the frequency of extreme fires increased during both day and night, the rate of increase was fastest at night. We saw this same pattern in last year’s early-season fires in Queensland.

Increasing nighttime fire is significant because rising humidity at night usually slows the growth of fire. This trend means firefighters are getting less respite at night.

Australia was a major hotspot of intense fire. Our land of booms and busts was characterised by sporadic extreme years, such as the devastating 2019-2020 Black Summer bushfires. These coincided with a period of record heat and drought.

The area burned in 2023 in northern Australia was even larger than the extent of the Black Summer bushfires. These recent fires in arid Australia occurred a year after heavy rains and extensive grass growth. When the grass dries out, it provides fuel loads that allow very large fires to form.

What’s to blame?

There’s little doubt climate change is contributing to much of the global increase in extreme fire events. Climate change is causing the air over land to become drier, which in turn makes fuel dryer, allowing more complete combustion. It is also leading to longer summers and worsening fire weather.

Last year was 1.48°C hotter than pre-industrial levels. It gave us a glimpse of what a typical year of 1.5°C of warming (the targeted limit under the Paris Agreement) might look like.

The way we manage ecosystems likely also plays an important role in the increase in extreme fires.

In particular, many years of suppressing almost all fires has caused a build-up of fuel in some ecosystems. Attempting to suppress all fires paradoxically predisposes forests to burn under the very worst of conditions. Fire suppression becomes impossible, resulting in very large fires.

How do we manage fire in a hotter climate?

Fire is an essential part of nature, and the health of fire-adapted ecosystems depends on it. We need to adapt our management of fire to sustainably live alongside it in a heating climate.

Humans have a major effect on shaping fire regimes through the way we engineer and manage environments. A key part of managing fire in a heating climate must involve managing ecosystems so fires do not become overly hot.

The path forward must embrace old and new approaches. It must welcome the deep wisdom of Indigenous fire management. For millennia, Indigenous Australians skilfully cultivated low-intensity fire regimes. They did this through frequent use of fire fine-tuned to the local ecology.

But reintroducing low-intensity fire to ecosystems that have accumulated large fuel loads under long-term fire suppression is not always straightforward. Some emerging techniques like mechanical thinning offer promise for helping to reintroduce fire into overgrown situations in the bushland-urban fringe. When coupled with controlled fire, mechanical thinning could help reduce the fire risk of overgrown vegetation and allow cool fire regimes to be used again.

People may be uncomfortable with chainsaws or goats in their nearby patch of bush. But the new climate we are entering calls for open-minded and meticulous testing of all available tools. Like all ecological processes, the right mitigation approaches will depend on the local ecological context.

While the area burned on Earth may be declining in some locations, extreme fires are on the rise. We must respond with a multi-pronged approach. That includes making strong progress on slowing climate change while rapidly adapting our management of built and wild landscapes.

Calum Cunningham, Postdoctoral Research Fellow in Pyrogeography, University of Tasmania; David Bowman, Professor of Pyrogeography and Fire Science, University of Tasmania, and Grant Williamson, Research Fellow in Environmental Science, University of Tasmania

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

Last summer, the Great Barrier Reef suffered its worst mass coral bleaching event. Our new data show the devastating damage the bleaching caused to a reef at Lizard Island – a finding that does not bode well for the rest of the natural wonder.

A colleague collected drone imagery from Lizard Island’s North Point Reef in March this year, and we replicated his image collection this month. The results show more than 97% of bleached corals on North Point Reef are now dead.

This is the first quantitative assessment of coral mortality from the last mass bleaching event. We don’t know how much coral died beyond this reef. But we do know that, according to other aerial surveys, almost one-third of the Great Barrier Reef experienced “very high” and “extreme” levels of coral bleaching last summer.

Clearly, if Australia wants to maintain the world-heritage status of the Great Barrier Reef – indeed, if it wants to preserve the reef at all – we must act now to prevent more coral deaths.

Measuring the damage

Bleaching occurs when corals expel algae from their tissues into surrounding waters, usually due to heat stress. It leaves the coral white, starved and more susceptible to disease. Some coral die immediately. Others may recover if conditions become more benign.

The Great Barrier Reef has experienced five mass bleaching events in the last decade – the most recent in March this year. It was the most severe and widespread mass bleaching event ever recorded there. The tragedy was part of the world’s fourth global coral bleaching event. That declaration was based on significant bleaching in both hemispheres of each ocean basin due to extensive ocean heat stress.

Not all bleached coral will die – it can bounce back. We wanted to find out how many corals affected by the March bleaching event were still alive three months later.

In March, George Roff at the CSIRO documented North Point Reef at Lizard Island using drone imagery. We replicated his imagery in June by also flying drones over the reef. We then snorkelled over the area to observe the situation first-hand.

The drones flew at an altitude of about 20 metres altitude and collected imagery at set times. We then joined the images into two large maps of the reef – one for March and one for June.

The first map showed corals were bleached or “fluorescing” – appearing brightly coloured as they released algae. The June map showed more than 97% of the same corals had died.

Four experts independently assessed the state of each coral in set areas on North Point Reef. This allows us to present our results at North Point with high certainty.

Looking ahead

The Australian Institute of Marine Science will reportedly release its annual report on coral reef conditions later this year. This week, UNESCO expressed “utmost concern” at mass coral bleaching and called on Australia to make public the extent of coral death “as soon as possible”.

Our data suggest an immediate action plan is needed to assess the extent of coral mortality on the Great Barrier Reef. It should include using remote sensing technologies, such as aerial drones and underwater remotely operated vehicles, to efficiently survey large areas. Both methods can provide standardised data and images of reefs, from shallow to deeper areas, which provide baseline data for future research.

Importantly, these data must be made accessible to those who wish to use it. Many scientists, tourists and commercial operators also collect data on the reef, and making all data freely available will help improve and update our understanding of reef health. This will ultimately lead to better decision-making.

We currently have more data than ever before about the Great Barrier Reef – and we need better systems to support open science. And if we are serious about maintaining reef health, Australians must take out international climate commitments seriously, and move quickly to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Jane Williamson, Professor in Marine Fisheries Ecology, Macquarie University; Karen Joyce, Associate Professor - Remote sensing and geospatial technology, James Cook University, and Vincent Raoult, Senior lecturer in marine ecology, Griffith University

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

Climate change threatens plants and animals around the world, but some regions are particularly exposed. Some are vulnerable simply due to the huge diversity of species they harbour. Others will experience more acute climate disruption than elsewhere. For some regions, such as Western Australia’s southwest, both are true.

WA’s southwest is a globally recognised “biodiversity hotspot”. Such regions have exceptionally high numbers of “endemic” species – those not found anywhere else – and have experienced significant habitat loss. And alarmingly, the region is fast becoming hotter and drier.

Our new research shows how climate stability in the past allowed ancient populations of small freshwater fish to persist today, despite their isolation. This stability is now at risk as climate change worsens, suggesting tough times ahead for these fish populations.

As the planet warms, ambitious conservation actions are urgently needed to save the iconic biodiversity of WA’s southwest – one of Australia’s natural treasures.

A hotspot for life

There are only two biodiversity hotspots in Australia: the coastal forests of eastern Australia, and southwest WA. The latter spans more than 356,000 square kilometres from Shark Bay to Esperance. It is home to more than 8,000 species of plants, over half of which are endemic. Its animal diversity is similarly impressive.

So how did southwest WA become such a melting pot of biodiversity? Scientists have proposed several reasons.

First, the surrounding arid land isolates it from the rest of Australia, which allowed a unique suite of species to assemble. Second, its landscape and species are ancient – many tracing back to Gondwanan origins. This suggests biodiversity has accumulated for hundreds of millions of years.

And finally, parts of this region have been protected against climate change for millions of years, including during glacial periods, due to a current carrying warm water down Western Australia’s coast. This climate stability is particularly relevant today.

Since the 1970s, rainfall in southwest WA has decreased by up to 15%, and is set to worsen in the near future. Annual temperatures have increased by more than 1°C since the start of the 20th century.

That raises an important question: if species in the region haven’t experienced much climate change in the past, can they cope with it now? Our research set out to answer this question by examining freshwater fish.

A surprising discovery

We used molecular ecology approaches, which combine genetic information with ecological and environmental data. We focused on two small freshwater fish species endemic to southwest WA – the western and little pygmy perches.

Our previous research showed these remarkable species have existed in the landscape for millions of years, despite not being able to move very far. They made ideal candidates for understanding how climate history might have shaped evolution.

We obtained genomic data from populations of these fish across southwest WA. From this, we determined their evolutionary histories, such as how long ago they last shared a common ancestor, and whether their populations had been connected in the past. Separately, using computer modelling, we investigated how past climates had affected where the species lived, and how this might change in future.

So what did we find? The populations of pygmy perches were very genetically distinct from each other. In fact they were so distinct, it is likely they comprise at least three, rather than two, different species.

We found two separate lineages of western pygmy perches. The analysis showed these lineages, despite looking physically similar, last shared an ancestor about nine million years ago. This suggests they should be classed as two distinct species, and the conservation status of both species should be reassessed.

Our genomic results also suggest these divergent populations of pygmy perches must have persisted in the landscape for millions of years. Our climate modelling supported this conclusion.

Our reconstructions of past climate found little evidence for large changes in the distribution of these species in the last three million years. This reflects the general stability in the climate over that time, which allowed these isolated populations to persist and form distinct lineages.

What about future climate change?

Unfortunately, things started to look dire when we looked at predictions under future climate changes. Large declines in ranges for the fish species were predicted in the coming decades.

For one of the western pygmy perch species, this included a total loss of suitable habitat by about 2070 under a “business-as-usual” scenario – that is, a scenario where no further efforts to reduce global carbon emissions are made.

Sadly, the effects of climate change on other freshwater species in this region are already being felt. Recent drying of streams has caused a decline in ancient insect species. And less winter-spring rainfall in the region is projected to reduce spawning in freshwater fish populations.

Drying and warming is also reducing the availability and quality of natural refuge pools, which most freshwater fish rely on to survive the dry season.

So what can be done? First, it’s important to make rivers and streams as healthy as can be. That includes restoring and protecting banks, and considering the needs of aquatic species when extracting water.

We must also prevent more non-native fish species from entering waterways, and explore the conservation potential of artificial aquatic refuges such as ponds and dams. And more drastic interventions, such as moving populations to new locations, may also be required.

Of course, reducing our carbon emissions will be crucial for the survival of biodiversity, especially freshwater fish, across the globe.

Climate change poses an existential threat to southwest WA’s unique natural environment and the species within it. Swift, broad-ranging action is needed to avoid tragic losses.

Sean Buckley, Lecturer in Molecular Ecology and Environmental Management, Edith Cowan University; Luciano Beheregaray, Matthew Flinders Professor of Biodiversity Genomics, Flinders University; Mark Allen, Post Doctoral Fellow, Centre for Sustainable Aquatic Ecosystems, Harry Butler Institute, Murdoch University, Murdoch University, and Stephen Beatty, Research Leader (Catchments to Coast), Centre for Sustainable Aquatic Ecosystems, Harry Butler Institute, Murdoch University

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

Coral bleaching is becoming much more common as a result of increasingly severe and frequent marine heatwaves. Four global mass bleaching events have happened since 1998. Two of these were in the past decade.

Unless greenhouse gas emissions are cut to slow global warming, our new research shows that, by 2080, coral bleaching will start in spring, rather than late summer. Some events will last into autumn. The Great Barrier Reef’s maximum annual heat stress will double by 2050 if emissions do not slow.

Marine heatwaves stress corals, which then expel the symbiotic algae living in their tissue. These corals are left white and weakened. While not all bleached corals die immediately, prolonged heat stress harms their health and reproduction.

Our research used daily data on sea surface temperatures (instead of monthly data that models typically use) and supercomputing to produce high-resolution projections of marine heatwaves. We showed the risk of coral bleaching will be greatest along the equator. That’s also where the most biodiverse coral reefs are found.

Coral reefs cover only 1% of our oceans, but host at least 25% of all marine species. More than half a billion people worldwide depend on coral reefs for food.

So coral reefs are vital for the health of the ocean and people. They are also among the ecosystems most at risk from climate change.

Longer bleaching season will hit spawning

The US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration monitors marine heatwaves globally. Seasonal coral bleaching alerts are based on this data. Predicting coral bleaching risk over entire decades has proved much more challenging.

Recent improvements in climate modelling now allow marine heatwaves and coral bleaching risks to be predicted with high accuracy. Using daily projections of heat stress from many global climate models, we show the severity and duration of coral bleaching will soon reach uncharted territory.

By mid-century coral bleaching is expected to start in spring for most of Earth’s reefs, rather than late summer as is typical today. In equatorial regions, corals will be at high risk of bleaching all year round by the end of the century.

In many regions, corals spawn only once a year. These spectacular mass spawning events happen in a single week following a full moon in spring.

By 2040, this spawning event could coincide with severe bleaching risk. This would greatly reduce their reproductive success, causing large-scale coral loss.

Equatorial regions most at risk

We show the future risk of severe coral bleaching is uneven globally.

The greatest risk is along the equator. Equatorial regions are home to the most biodiverse coral reefs, including conservation hotspots such as the Coral Triangle. To make matters worse, marine life in these regions is particularly vulnerable to accelerated climate change.

Many equatorial species are already living at temperatures near their upper tolerance. They also generally have low abilities to move to track shifting climates. This leaves them at high risk of extinction.

Our research shows equatorial regions are set to benefit least from efforts to curb emissions. We expect significant emission cuts will reduce the annual duration of severe bleaching conditions in all areas except these regions.

The projected highest climate impacts coincide with highest social reliance on coral reefs. This will challenge human populations that rely heavily on their local reefs for their livelihoods and nutrition.

Improving coral reef management

Our research identifies Earth’s reef regions that are at lowest risk of increased bleaching. This will help conservation managers and policymakers prioritise efforts to limit loss of coral reef biodiversity.

We predict much less risk of coral bleaching in regions such as the northern coasts of Venezuela and Colombia, Socotra Island (opposite the Gulf of Aden) and Alor Kecil in Indonesia. Seasonal upwellings occur here, bringing cooler water to the surface that’s likely to limit the severity of heatwaves.

Identifying these future havens for coral reefs will help maximise the success of coral conservation strategies such as assisted evolution, coral restoration or transplantation.

These strategies can help maintain healthy coral populations at local scales, particularly if used on reefs where future climate impacts will be lower. By pinpointing these havens, our research will strengthen coral conservation.

Our research includes a user-friendly web-based tool for mapping future coral bleaching. It will help pinpoint locations for effective management interventions.

Curbing greenhouse gas emissions is the main solution to reduce future climate impacts on corals. However, other strategies are also vital to maximise coral reefs’ adaptation to climate change.

Camille Mellin, Senior Lecturer and ARC Future Fellow, School of Biological Sciences, University of Adelaide and Damien Fordham, Associate Professor of Global Change Ecology, University of Adelaide

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

The radio crackles into life on a small boat off an idyllic beach in Ningaloo Marine Park, Western Australia. Two recreational fishers are trying to catch prized spangled emperors in a sanctuary zone, where all fishing is supposed to be banned, to help protect this fish from overfishing.

A recreational fisher further down the coast is using his radio to alert others of the imminent arrival of marine park wardens in a patrol boat. The two fishers calmly stash their rods, power up the large outboard engine, and motor away from the sanctuary zone. By the time the wardens arrive, all appears calm and well. This scenario illustrates how challenging it can be protect marine wildlife from the sometimes damaging effects of human activities, such as fishing.

Almost every country in the world is trying to achieve an internationally agreed legal target to protect 30% of their land and sea area by 2030. Setting up marine protected areas, such as marine parks, is an important way of achieving this target. But they have to be effective in actually reducing the negative effects of human activities, as well as fair to local people in avoiding excessive restrictions. There are concerns that the race to create more marine protected areas or underwater nature reserves could be distracting governments from the challenges of ensuring that conservation measures are as effective as possible in fairly reducing harm from human activities that threaten marine wildlife, such as fishing and tourism.

To explore different ways of addressing such challenges, our research assessed the effectiveness of 50 marine protected areas in 24 countries, from Ecuador to Madagascar and Vietnam. We compared the strengths and weaknesses of different conservation measures for protecting marine wildlife by using a set of 36 “governance incentives” – these include providing financial compensation, requiring legal accountability and establishing local groups that encourage community participation in discussions, decisions and related research.

Working with 70 researchers from various countries, we interviewed around 20 people involved in each of the 50 marine protected areas, from fishermen to tourism operators and recreational sea users. We also analysed marine conservation measures to see how effective they were and observed day-to-day activities on the coast.

Our aim was to understand how people perceive the effectiveness of some of these marine conservation measures and explore their views about which activities, such as fishing, could be better managed.

The 50 MPAs scored a low average of 2/5 for effectiveness – a lot of protective conservation measures were in place on paper but they were not effective in reducing the harmful effects of certain human activities to protect marine wildlife. This reveals the need for these marine protected areas to make a more tangible difference, rather than just being what many term “paper parks”, that exist in legal texts but not in practical reality.

Our research confirms that there’s no one key to success – different combinations of conservation measures work best to improve effectiveness in different locations. One clear overall trend was that a more diverse mix of management approaches resulted in greater reduction of the effects of fishing, tourism and other human activities.

Tackling illegal fishing

In Western Australia, Ningaloo and Shark Bay marine parks demonstrate how this can be done relatively well to reduce negative effects and better conserve marine wildlife. Here, fisheries officers enforce legal restrictions on recreational fishing, which has led to the recovery of some previously overfished populations, such as pink snapper, and increases in recreational fishing catches. But it can be challenging to prevent illegal fishing in remote no-take sanctuaries, as the scenario above illustrates. Recreational fishers who are caught breaking the rules are fined, but these fixed penalties are often not enough to discourage further illegal fishing.

Marine wildlife watching, particularly for whale sharks and bottlenose dolphins, is managed through a restricted number of licences for tour boats to operate. Legal conditions to prevent disturbance to whale sharks and dolphins are attached to these licences, enforced by vessels competitively watching each others operations, in the hope that they can acquire additional wildlife watching licences. Satellite surveillance and patrols by wardens helps to monitor wildlife watching vessels.

Ningaloo and Shark Bay marine parks also promote fairness to local people. The traditional ways of life of aboriginal Australians are respected and their understanding of ecosystems generated over many generations is learnt from. They are employed as wardens and research officers for the parks. Each of these two parks has a committee that provides for participation in discussions and decisions by local people representing different interests, including aboriginal Australians.

Ecosystems are more resilient to the impact of human activities if they support a wider diversity of species. Marine protected areas represent complex social and ecological systems, each interacting in different ways with local people in coastal communities. Our research shows that there’s no one-size-fits-all solution. There are examples of good practice, such as Ningaloo and Shark Bay marine parks, but even they aren’t perfect, as the challenge with illegal fishing illustrates. And what works in one situation may not work in another.

Our research also shows that to successfully protect 30% of their land and sea by 2030, governments and local people should use diverse management approaches in combination, rather than unrealistically seeking one best solution. The key to resilience is diversity, both of species in ecosystems and conservation measures in protected area management systems.

Peter JS Jones, Emeritus Professor of Environmental Governance, UCL

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

All over the world, frogs are being wiped out by the chytrid fungus. At least 500 species have declined, including as many as 90 species now presumed extinct.

This catastrophic and ongoing biodiversity loss surpasses the devastation wrought by other notorious invasive species such as cats, rats and even cane toads. Short of removing species from the wild and treating them in captivity, few strategies exist to deal with the chytrid threat.

Our new research, published today in the journal Nature, offers a promising option.

Outbreaks of chytrid (pronounced “KY-trid”) are more common in cold winter months – just like seasonal human flu. We found a way to combat these winter outbreaks using heat. Our purpose-built “frog saunas” allow affected amphibians to warm up and bake off their infections. They are so simple you can build a frog sauna using supplies from the hardware store.

Why should we care about frogs?

If frogs’ good looks are not enough for you to care about their welfare, perhaps learning how they contribute to the environment or human health will pique your interest.

Frogs eat insects that carry and spread human diseases. Their skin is also a rich source of new medicines that could help us combat antibiotic-resistant “superbugs” or curb the startling increase in opioid addiction.

The frogs themselves are food for many predators, including humans.

Often starting life as a tadpole eating algae, before morphing into a carnivorous adult, frogs carry energy from aquatic ecosystems onto land – where it can be transferred throughout the food web. So losing a single frog species can have serious flow-on effects.

The origin and spread of chytrid

It’s likely the chytrid fungus originated in Asia, where the pathogen seems to coexist with native amphibians. But chytrid is deadly elsewhere, possibly because other frogs have no natural defences.

Chytrid harms frogs by disrupting the integrity of their skin, depleting electrolytes needed for heart function. Infected frogs can die of cardiac arrest.

Chytrid has spread worldwide through the trade of amphibians, becoming a seemingly permanent part of ecosystems. As eradicating chytrid from the wild is not possible, we need a way to help frogs battle infection.

Introducing frog saunas

Research has shown chytrid is worse in winter. My colleagues and I wondered whether, if frogs had access to warmth during winter, could they fight off infection?

The fungus can’t tolerate high temperatures, so if we gave frogs a place to stay warm – even for a few hours a day – perhaps they could survive and recover.

We tested this idea, both in the laboratory and in outdoor experiments.

First we established that endangered green and golden bell frogs will select temperatures that reduce or eliminate chytrid infections, when given the opportunity.

Then we conducted experiments in the lab, with 66 infected frogs. The group given the option of choosing the temperature they liked best rapidly cleared their infection. The group placed in a set, warm temperature also cleared their infection, but it took longer. The low-temperature control group remained infected.

Next, we wanted to see what would happen if frogs that cured infections with heat would still get sick. Or were they immune? The group of 23 heat-cured frogs were 22 times more likely to survive the second infection than the 23 frogs that were heat-treated but not previously infected. So frogs cured with heat acquire resistance to future infections.

Finally, we wanted to see if this could work in a natural setting. We ran outdoor experiments with 239 frogs. Half were infected with chytrid one week before the experiment began. Then they were placed in enclosures with artificial structures that heat up in the sun, called “frog saunas”. But the frogs could choose from shaded and unshaded areas, with or without saunas.

We found frogs flocked to the sunny saunas, heated up their little bodies, and quickly fought off infection. Think of frog saunas as little factories that pump out healthy, chytrid-resistant frogs.

The frog saunas could be used on a wider scale. We believe they would be best suited to supporting populations of Australian green and golden bell frogs, but they could be useful for other species too.

The saunas are made of inexpensive materials that can be found at your local hardware store, making them accessible to the general public and wildlife managers alike.

We are already building shelters at Sydney Olympic Park, working with Macquarie University and the Sydney Olympic Park Authority. The park is home to one of the largest remaining populations of green and golden bell frogs.

Want to get involved?

You can become a citizen scientist and help save frogs from extinction. Start by downloading the FrogID app to learn how frogs are faring. Record frog calls with the app for scientists to identify them. This helps provide valuable data for frog conservation.

Build a frog sauna for your backyard, to help keep them healthy through winter.

It’s essentially a brick-filled greenhouse, warmed by sunlight. All you need is some common clay ten-hole masonry bricks, black paint and cable ties – and a little greenhouse to put the sauna inside.

Changing the fate of frogs

Since the discovery of chytrid more than 25 years ago, the pathogen has been a seemingly insurmountable challenge to endangered frog conservation. Now, we have developed a promising, inexpensive and widely applicable strategy to combat chytrid.

Amphibians are such a diverse group that no single approach will be suitable for all species. So this is no silver bullet. But a useful tool for even one threatened or endangered species is cause for optimism.

The concept could also be applied to other wildlife diseases, where differences between the physiology of the host and pathogen can be exploited.

Anthony Waddle, Schmidt Science Fellow in Conservation Biology, Macquarie University

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

As curator at Manchester Museum for 18 years, I’ve helped create a new exhibition, Wild, that showcases some incredible projects that are bringing plants and animals back from the brink of extinction, healing the land and restoring hope.

Often, the story of wildlife loss and climate change can seem overwhelming, so I’m excited about highlighting solutions that tackle some of the negative ways people influence nature. From June 5 2024 to June 1 2025, this exhibition brings these stories to life, through a rich selection of plants and animals from the near-extinct purple emperor butterfly that thrives at Knepp, an estate in West Sussex, England, to wolves making a dramatic return to Yellowstone National Park in the US.

The Wild team and I have chosen objects, films and photographs that highlight some of the most inspiring ways people are rewilding landscapes, from community action to protect green spaces in the city of Manchester to restoring the ancestral lands and practices of previously colonial land in south-west Australia by the Noongar people. By inspiring awe and wonder, the exhibition gives glimpses of how nature can thrive when given the opportunity.

The word “wild” means different things to different people and, in terms of rewilding, what works in one place may not work in another. But all the projects featured in Wild have a fresh approach to biodiversity loss and embrace a brighter future where people and nature thrive.

Isle of Arran

A velvet swimming crab (pictured above) crawls through stunning pink-purple maerl – a type of hard seaweed – on the seabed in Lamlash Bay, where the marine ecosystem has flourished. A decade-long campaign by the Community of Arran Seabed Trust culminated in Scotland’s first No Take Zone where no fish or shellfish can be taken from the water, seabed or shore, in 2008. This is a response to the effects of overfishing and dredging that led to the collapse of the marine ecosystem around the bay.

The thriving maerl beds of Lamlash Bay are a sign of a healthy seabed. These habitats support abundant wildlife such as crabs and shellfish and act as nursery areas for commercial species, such as cod, scallops and pollock. Maerl grows very slowly, around 1mm per year, but over time they can create complex habitats that rival those of coral reefs. In unprotected areas, maerl is easily damaged by seabed dredging and trawling and because of their slow growth, it takes a long time to recover.

In just ten years, this marine ecosystem has started to recover with both seabed biodiversity and the size and abundance of commercial species increasing.

Knepp

The Knepp Estate is a trailblazing 3,500-acre rewilding project in West Sussex where the reintroduction of Tamworth pigs has transformed the landscape through turning over the soil and adding dung. By grazing the lush vegetation, just seven pigs have created conditions for increased biodiversity, such as the rare purple emperor butterfly. Knepp is now a breeding hotspot for nightingales and turtle doves.

For 17 years, landowner Charlie Burrell tried to farm this land but found it impossible to compete with new, industrialised farms on better soils. In 2002, inspired by European rewilding projects, he began a new more regenerative approach.

At Knepp pigs, cattle, deer and horses churn up the ground and trim back plants, stopping trees from taking over. Their dung restores the soil by adding nutrients. These grazers and browsers create dynamic new habitats for a wide range of plants and animals. By introducing grazers and then taking a hands-off approach, there has been an increase in biodiversity.

Yellowstone

Yellowstone National Park in the US is 2.2 million acres (almost half the size of Wales). This park played a pivotal role in the birth of “fortress conservation”, the controversial idea that wildlife thrives best when isolated from people. This saw the forced removal of Indigenous people from the land in preference for creating and protecting an area of wilderness.

In 1926, the last wolf pack was systematically killed in the park. Conservationists realised that the removal of wolves had knock-on effects on the ecosystem. In the 1990s, the government decided to reintroduce wolves into Yellowstone. This affected local communities and their relationships with wildlife.

Now, wolves help restore the ecological balance of this area by reducing the number of elk grazing willow on the riverbanks. This provides more food for beavers, which create dams and enrich wetlands. This photo hints at the more complex ecosystems that are now developing in Yellowstone.

The presence of wolves divides opinion, but while they were once portrayed as the scourge of wildlife, they’re now viewed by many as a force for good.

Urban Manchester

Cities are not just full of people, they are also home to a diverse range of species: some we notice and like, others we notice and don’t like, and others we simply ignore.

Green cities are attractive, good for our health and wellbeing, and can become more liveable in a changing climate. Manchester aims to encourage nature to thrive.

These dandelions encroaching onto our streets and alleyways are a source of joy to some while others find them messy. Some people see dandelions as weeds and a home to rats.

Sometimes scruffy places that are good for nature are not ones people feel comfortable with. In making green spaces that are good for people to use, we sometimes lose the natural wildness and the wildlife that was there already.

Wild can offer hope. It is about relationships between people and the natural world so it matters what wild means and how it is done. This exhibition aims to encourage people to rethink what “wild” means to them, to find inspiration in messy city centre spaces and to celebrate the abundance of nature when it is given space to thrive.

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David Gelsthorpe, Curator of Earth Sciences, University of Manchester

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You would have learned about the “water cycle” in primary school – water’s journey, from evaporation to rainfall to flowing in a stream or sinking into the ground to become groundwater.

Despite how simple it sounds, there are actually some large unknowns in the cycle – especially concerning groundwater.

We don’t know, for example, how fast aquifers – porous rock layers saturated with water – recharge. Or how much water actually makes it underground. And how much rain do you need to refill these underground reservoirs?

These questions are crucial because we rely very heavily on groundwater. It’s far and away the world’s largest source of fresh water we can access. There’s more water in the polar ice, but we can’t use it.

Our research team has been exploring a new approach to groundwater: going down to where the water is, using caves, tunnels and mines. We have installed a new network of groundwater sensors in 14 sites across Australia’s southeast – some more than 100 metres below the surface.

This is already giving us valuable data. For instance, in old mines in the Victorian gold mining town of Walhalla, we found it took more rain than we expected to start the recharge.

Why does groundwater recharge matter?

Worldwide, we are using groundwater much faster than it can naturally replenish. Researchers have found rapid declines in the water table of over 0.5 metres a year across many regions globally.

This is a real concern for Australia, the world’s driest inhabited continent. While the tropical north gets plenty of rain, it’s harder to come by elsewhere.

Across the continent, groundwater accounts for 17% of our accessible water resources. But it accounts for more than 30% of our total water use.

Groundwater is an essential resource, estimated to contribute A$6.8 billion to GDP.

In the Murray Darling Basin, groundwater extraction increased between 2003 and 2016, reaching 1,335 billion litres a year on average.

Native plants and animals in arid regions often rely entirely on groundwater bubbling up through springs.

Perth relied so heavily on groundwater that it’s depleting its aquifer, forcing the government to build desalination plants. Even now, Western Australia relies on groundwater for two-thirds of its water needs.

This is why recharge rates matter. If we’re using groundwater at the same rate it recharges or less, that’s sustainable use. But if we’re pumping out far more than it can refill, that’s unsustainable.

Groundwater recharges from rainfall which seeps through the soil into deeper layers where evaporation can’t get to it. It can also refill from surface waters. But recharge is difficult to measure accurately.

How can we better track groundwater recharging?

Researchers in Darwin recently undertook the largest analysis to date of long-term rainfall recharge across Australia. They used 98,000 estimates of recharge rates, using data from bores and machine learning algorithms.

The result was surprising. They estimated the average recharge rate for the Australian continent was just 44 millimetres per year. But it differs a great deal depending on where you are. In humid, wet climates such as across the Top End, the water table rose by 203mm a year. But in arid climates, it was just 6mm.

For comparison, the typical annual rainfall in Sydney and Brisbane is just over 1,000mm per year.

This study poses a challenge to our understanding of groundwater recharge. The estimates in this study are substantially lower than studies relying on contemporary water balance models, which report more than double the amount of recharge for Australia.

One issue is the Darwin research was not able to show where the groundwater came from or how old the water is. You might think groundwater recharges quickly, but a quick recharge means it takes years. A slow recharge can take thousands of years.

This gap is a concern. Our water authorities need the most accurate data possible on annual recharge rates – and the age of the water.

Our network of hydrological loggers are now gathering underground data in sites such as the gold mine in Stawell, in Victoria, and South Australia’s Naaracoorte Caves, famous for fossils, as well as mines and tunnels in New South Wales, Queensland and Tasmania.

Natural caves and groundwater are often fairly shallow. We wanted to get deeper data, which is why we chose mines. Our deep sites are over 100 metres underground.

Our sensors can detect each groundwater recharge event by doing something very simple: counting drips from the ceiling, and comparing them to what’s happening on the surface, so we can see where and when groundwater recharges.

Last month, we presented initial results, which show large variation.

Walhalla lies in the foothills of the Great Dividing Range outside Melbourne. It’s relatively rainy, with over 1,200mm per year.

Our sensors showed us the water table here had recharged 15 separate times over the 18 months to March 2024.

Despite the high annual rainfall, more than 40mm of rainfall over two days was needed to overcome dry summer conditions and cause recharge to start.

By contrast, Stawell’s gold mine is in an arid climate ~200 kilometres west of Melbourne, with under 500mm of rain annually. Even 100 metres underground, we could see water from rainfall moving through small pathways in the rock. But unlike Walhalla, we could not see the effects of individual rainstorms. By the time the water got that deep, any pulses were smoothed out.

We hope our data will be useful to groundwater researchers and water authorities, and expand how much we know about a resource we think little about – but which matters a great deal to how we live.

Andy Baker, Professor, School of Biological, Earth and Environmental Sciences, UNSW Sydney; Margaret Shanafield, Senior researcher, Hydrology/hydrogeology, Flinders University; Marilu Melo Zurita, Associate Professor Human Geography, UNSW Sydney; Stacey Priestley, Research Scientist, Environment Business Unit, CSIRO, and Wendy Timms, Professor of Environmental Engineering, Deakin University

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Coal will no longer be burned for power in Australia within 14 years. To replace it will require faster deployment of solar and wind, storage, new transmission lines and some firming gas capacity.

That’s a very brief summary of a large and influential document – the Integrated System Plan issued by the Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO) every two years.

The latest version of this plan was issued today. Think of it as a roadmap, showing what we need to build and where to be able to wean ourselves off burning fossil fuels for electricity.

It shows the lowest cost way to give us electricity in the future is renewable energy, connected with transmission and distribution, firmed with storage and using gas-powered generation as farmers might use a diesel generator – as a backup plan.

What about nuclear, given Peter Dutton’s pledge to build seven reactors? The plan doesn’t consider it, because nuclear power is currently not legal. But an accompanying AEMO fact sheet notes CSIRO’s GenCost report found nuclear generation to be a lot more expensive than other options:

In fact, it is one of the most expensive ways to generate electricity according to GenCost [and] the time it would take to design and build nuclear generation would be too slow to replace retiring coal fired generation.

What is this plan for?

Australia’s main grid connects eastern and southern states, where most of us live. Historically, it was built to connect cheap but polluting coal plants to large cities.

As coal plants retire, we need a different grid so we can draw renewable power from many different locations and use storage as backup.

That’s what this plan is intended to do. To create it, AEMO relies on detailed modelling and consultation across the energy sector. This brings it to what the operator calls an “optimal development path” – energy speak for the cheapest and most effective mix of electricity generation, storage and transmission, which meets our reliability and security needs while supporting emission cutting policies in the long-term interests of consumers.

One of the most important roles for the plan is to show where we need new electrical infrastructure – especially transmission lines.

The key findings of the final plan have not materially changed from the draft. But there are some changes worth noting.

Emissions reductions to the fore

In November last year, emissions reductions were formally embedded as an objective in our national electricity laws.

In March this year, the market commission issued guidelines on how to apply these changes to the objectives in various processes, including the Integrated System Plan.

There are important figures in this guidance, namely the value of emissions reduction, set at A$70 per tonne today to $420 per tonne by 2050. This is not a direct carbon price. It lets us assess the value of different grid pathways in terms of cutting emissions.

AEMO calculated an extra $3.3 billion in benefits realised in the optimal development path when including this value. Including this benefit is expected to help get some transmission projects get approval.

More storage, delayed transmission

New transmission projects have also proved controversial and difficult to develop, while the New England renewable energy zone in NSW has hit substantial delays. AEMO’s draft plan envisaged this important solar and wind rich region would reach full capacity by 2028. This has blown out to 2033.

The good news? In the seven months since the draft came out, a huge amount of new storage has begun to arrive. Some 3,700 megawatts of storage capacity (10.8 gigawatt hours worth of energy) have progressed to the point it can be included in the plan.

There are signs the renewable roll-out has slowed down, due to grid congestion, approvals and the need for more transmission lines. Things are still ticking along – since the draft plan was put out for consultation in December last year, another 490 megawatts of large-scale generation has entered the grid. This does need to speed up: the plan envisages 6,000 megawatts of renewable capacity, including rooftop solar, arriving yearly.

What does it say about nuclear power?

Nothing at all. The Integrated System Plan only models technologies legal in Australia, such as black coal with carbon capture and storage. Nuclear power was banned by the Howard Coalition government in the late 1990s.

The AEMO fact sheet makes mention of nuclear to point out that it is a very expensive form of energy and would not arrive in time to replace retiring coal plants. We would need something else in the interim.

The Coalition has indicated it would support new gas-fired to ensure the electricity grid remained reliable until nuclear plants were online.

What about ‘renewable droughts’?

To smooth out the peaks and troughs of renewable generation, we will need different firming technologies. These include storage such as batteries and pumped hydro, as well as traditional hydro, gas and other fuelled generation. Firming help manage changes in supply and demand and ensure a reliable system. Demand response – where users are rewarded to use less during peak periods – can also help ensure reliability.

AEMO’s report argues “flexible gas” generation will have to provide back-up supply during periods of what Germans call “dunkelflaute” – long periods of dark and still days during mid-winter, when solar and wind generation go missing. Flexible gas is expected to play a role for extreme peak demand, particularly in winter.

But this capacity is expected to be very rarely used. Think of “flexible gas” as you would a diesel generator – you’ve got it as a backup if needed. In the near future, a generator like this may generate just 5% of its annual potential. The emissions intensity of a grid with so little gas generation will be tiny.

Does this mean we’ll never be able to entirely banish fossil fuels? Not necessarily. Greener alternatives, such as green hydrogen or methanol, might mean we can take the last step away from burning fossil fuels for power.

Dylan McConnell, Senior Research Associate, Renewable Energy & Energy Systems Analyst, UNSW Sydney

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

The Coalition shook up Australia’s energy debate last week when it unveiled the seven sites where, if elected, it would build nuclear power plants. In making the announcement, the Coalition emphasised the importance of community consultation in its nuclear energy plan. But what does that actually mean?

Back in 2019, Ted O'Brien, now the Coalition’s shadow energy minister, said governments should only pursue nuclear power with a “commitment to community consent for approving nuclear facilities”. As then chair of the parliament’s energy committee, he released a report titled “Not without your approval”.

Last week the Nationals’ deputy leader Perin Davey backed this position, indicating the Coalition would not proceed with nuclear power plants in towns that were adamantly opposed.

But now the Coalition has changed its tune. They will explain the benefits of nuclear power to communities set to host reactors, rather than giving residents the power to veto the plans. That means the Coalition will simply be consulting communities about how to implement a done deal.

No right to veto

The seven sites for nuclear power plants mooted by the Coalition are: Tarong and Callide in Queensland; Liddell and Mount Piper in New South Wales; Port Augusta in South Australia; Loy Yang in Victoria; and Muja in Western Australia.

In a position at odds with the Coalition’s previous stance, Nationals leader David Littleproud last week said the proposed nuclear plants would not be contingent on the consent of local communities. Instead, the Coalition government would be “prepared to make the tough decisions in the national interest”.

The two-and-a-half-year consultation process would “take the Australian people on a journey” and ensure they understood the plan, Littleproud said.

Similarly, Opposition Leader Peter Dutton said community consultation would not be about securing the consent of affected communities, but rather about explaining why nuclear power plants are a good idea:

we will consult about the benefits, frankly, for those communities, and how we can help revitalise some of those towns at the moment that are wilting.

All this raises the prospect of communities being forced to host nuclear reactors against their wishes.

Top 3 issues with community consultation

The mixed messages from the Coalition highlight three problems with community consultation, as I outline below.

1. Will community views be acted on?

If community members are not granted the authority to influence the outcome of a consultation process, is it actually “consultation”? According to procedural justice scholars, the answer is no.

Proponents of controversial projects often point to community consultation efforts to claim they have a social licence to operate. But there are ethical concerns associated with purportedly granting people a “voice” in decisions, simply to satisfy the appearance of procedural fairness, with no intention of actually taking their views into account.

Community consultation should be a genuine attempt to gauge the views of those affected by a decision in order to shape an outcome. If this is not the intention, we should call it something else – and be clear with people about what is within their power to control.

2. Who is being consulted?

A “community” is not a united, homogeneous group. A resident of a town may also be part of other communities. Perhaps they are a member of an online Taylor Swift fan club, a Ghostbusters appreciation society, or a 5G opposition group. These other affiliations link them to other realities and viewpoints.

In our digital world, we cannot ignore the influence of online communities. Nor can we ignore the problems posed by misinformation and disinformation that create further polarisation.

In a town of people with different (and often polarised) points of view, no single voice represents “the community”. There are several ways to determine what is “the common good” or in the community’s interest.

International best practice shows us the solution lies in good process: ensuring genuine engagement of diverse voices at all stages, from policy design through to implementation.

3. In-principle support versus reality

The Coalition plans to take its nuclear proposal to the federal election and then, if elected, implement it with a national mandate. This ignores the fact that a voter may be broadly supportive of nuclear energy or wind power in principle, yet fiercely opposed when a project is proposed near where they live.

Opposition to local projects is sometimes derided as NIMBY-ism. But when weighing up development proposals that may benefit the environment, it’s legitimate to question whether the burden is being fairly shared across society.

Even if the Coalition wins the federal election and claims a nuclear energy mandate, support for reactors to be built at targeted locations is by no means assured – and may be fiercely resisted. We have seen such resistance in the struggle to secure a permanent site for nuclear waste storage in Australia.

Genuine consultation, directly involving those impacted, is crucial to resolving such impasses and building community support.

Building trust in government

The Coalition has promised jobs and cheaper electricity for communities hosting a nuclear power station. But research suggests these incentives may not be enough to get communities on board, because the perceived risk of nuclear power plants is also key to public support.
Research also suggests that for those in the community who lack specialist knowledge about nuclear energy, much of their support, or otherwise, will depend on their level of trust in technology and government.

If the Coalition wants to build support for nuclear power, it must do more than make promises about cheap energy and new jobs. It should educate the community about the science and technology involved and ensure risks to that community are properly alleviated.

It must also work to build trust – or mitigate distrust – in the government that asks a community to take this leap.

Diane Sivasubramaniam, Associate Professor and Chair, Department of Psychological Sciences, Swinburne University of Technology and Samuel Wilson, Associate Professor of Leadership, Swinburne University of Technology

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Australia contains some of the world’s most biologically diverse and carbon-dense native forests. Eucalypts in wet temperate forests are the tallest flowering plants in the world and home to an array of unique tree-dwelling marsupials, rare birds, insects, mosses, fungi and lichen, many of which have not even been catalogued by scientists. Yet our country remains in the top ten list globally for tree cover loss, with almost half of the original forested areas in eastern Australia cleared.

This loss has been devastating for Australia’s native plants and animals and contributes to global warming through vast amounts of carbon emissions. The global biodiversity and climate change crises are inextricably linked – we cannot solve one without the other.

Earth’s ecosystems, such as forests, coastal wetlands and tundra, contain enormous amounts of carbon. But deforestation and degradation by humans is likely to send global warming past 1.5°C, even if we achieve net-zero fossil fuel emissions. Protecting native forests is a critical way to prevent emissions, which must be achieved in parallel with a rapid transition to clean energy.

What is being overlooked in current international climate policy under the Paris Agreement is the crucial role of biodiversity in maintaining healthy ecosystems and their integrity, which keeps carbon stored in forests, not the atmosphere. Healthy ecosystems are more stable and resilient, with a lower risk of trees dying and lower rates of carbon emissions.

The way we currently count carbon stores risk creating incentives to plant new trees rather than protect existing forests. Yet old-growth forests store vastly more carbon than young saplings, which will take decades or even centuries to reach the same size.

On January 1 this year, both Victoria and Western Australia ended native forest logging in state forests. This is a good start. But the rest of Australia is still logging native forests. Extensive land clearing continues for agriculture and urban development, as well as native forest harvesting on private land.

Two states down, more to go

The end of native timber logging in two states is a chance for new approaches to our forests, which recognise the contribution of biodiversity to healthy forest ecosystems, as well as endangered species protection and clean water supplies.

Ending native forest logging isn’t entirely simple. In Victoria, consultation on the future of state forests is ongoing. The Victorian Environmental Assessment Council is due to release its final recommendations in July.

The Victorian government has also put in place a Forestry Transition Program to help forest contractors find alternative work in forest and land management. Some of these transition programs are proving controversial.

In Western Australia, around 2.5 million hectares of the state’s south-west forests will be protected under a new Forest Management Plan. Protection of these landscapes is critical, as they have been hit by another die-back event due to drought and record heat.

These forests hold significant cultural and ecological value. Known in Noongar as “djarilmari”, they are vital habitats for diverse plants and animals, including endemic species such as the ngwayir (western ringtail possum) and the giant jarrah trees.

What about other states and territories?

In New South Wales, the government is looking into proposals for a Great Koala National Park, which would bring together state forests from the Clarence Valley to south of Coffs Harbour. But with no decision yet made, logging continues along both the north and south coasts, which were also hard hit by the Black Summer bushfires of 2019-20.

In Tasmania, native forest logging fell sharply between 2012 and 2019. This cut emissions by around 22 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent per year, equivalent to almost a quarter of Australia’s transport emissions.

Recent policy changes protecting giant trees will help protect some patches of forests. But native forest logging is set to expand in other areas, including clear felling of old-growth rainforest and tall wet eucalypt forest.

Native forest logging is slated to end in 70,000 hectares of south-east Queensland state forests at the end of this year, under a longstanding Native Timber Action Plan. But logging and widespread land clearing continues elsewhere in the state, ensuring Australia’s place in the top 10 deforestation hotspots.

Can ending native forest logging help the climate?

We’ll need to go further and ban logging in all native forests in Australia to help meet our net-zero emissions target, while meeting timber demand from better-managed and increased plantations.

Stopping native forest logging avoids the emissions released when forests are cut and burned. It would also allow continued forest growth and regrowth of previously logged areas, which draws down carbon from the atmosphere and increases the amount held in the forest ecosystem.

The natural biodiversity of our native forests makes them more resilient to external disturbances such as climate change. These forests have larger and more stable carbon stocks than logged areas, newly planted forests and plantations.

If we compare forests protected for conservation with those harvested for commodity production in the Victorian Central Highlands, research shows conservation delivers the greatest climate benefits through continued forest growth and accumulating carbon stocks.

There are growing calls to create the Great Forests National Park to the north and east of Melbourne, which would protect a further 355,000 hectares and more than double protected forests in the Central Highlands.

Net zero: deep, rapid, sustained cuts needed

The world’s nations are aiming to reach “net zero” by mid-century. Meeting this target will require deep and rapid cuts in carbon dioxide emissions as well as pulling carbon out of the atmosphere into land sinks, especially forests.

The land sector is unique in that it can be both a source (logging, agriculture) and a sink (forest regrowth, for instance) for carbon. The natural way forests take up carbon can be increased through natural regrowth or plantations.

Unfortunately, the current approach, based on IPCC guidelines, to counting this type of natural carbon storage can lead to perverse outcomes.

The carbon sink from forest regrowth only counts towards the “removals” part of net zero when it results from changes we make, such as ending native forest logging. It doesn’t count if it’s regrowth after a natural event such as a bushfire. It’s important to count only human-induced changes in our climate targets.

Tree planting, on the other hand, can be counted towards net-zero targets, despite the fact that newly planted trees will take centuries to sequester as much carbon as found in an old-growth forest.

This type of accounting – known as flow-based accounting – can mean a premium is placed on planting and maintaining young forests with high carbon uptake rates, overlooking the substantial benefits of protecting larger trees in native forests.

That is, this approach favours carbon sequestration (the process of taking carbon out of the atmosphere and storing it in wood) over carbon storage (the total carbon stocks already contained in a forest).

A comprehensive approach to forest carbon accounting would recognise both flows of carbon (as sequestration) and carbon stocks (as storage) contribute to the benefits that native forests offer for reducing emissions.

Carbon accounting needs more clarity

This becomes a problem when forests and fossil fuels are included in a net accounting framework, such as the one used in Australia’s national greenhouse gas inventory.

In net accounts, emissions (from fossil fuel and land sectors) within a year are added to removals, which includes the sequestration of carbon into forests and other ecosystems.

Because this type of accounting only counts the flows of carbon – not existing stocks – it omits the climate benefits of protecting existing forests, whose stored carbon dwarfs the amount Australia emits from fossil fuels each year.

But if we separated out targets for the fossil fuel and land sectors, we could properly treat forest carbon stocks as an asset, giving us incentives to protect them.

Another problem with net accounting is it treats all carbon as equivalent, meaning a tonne of carbon sequestered in trees compensates for a tonne of carbon from burned fossil fuels. This has no scientific basis. Carbon dioxide emissions are effectively permanent, as the buried carbon we dig up and burn stays in the atmosphere for millennia, while carbon in trees is temporary in comparison.

As trees grow, their carbon storage compensates for earlier logging and clearing emissions, which is an important climate benefit. But we’re not comparing apples and apples – forest carbon doesn’t compensate for fossil fuel emissions.

Logging bans are important – but no substitute for ending oil and gas

While ending the clearing and logging of native vegetation is vital for both climate and biodiversity, it’s no substitute for preventing emissions from fossil fuels.

To make this clearer, we must urgently set separate targets for emissions cuts for fossil fuels and increased carbon removal in the land sector. This will ensure phasing out fossil fuel use is not delayed by planting trees, and that the carbon stocks of biodiverse and carbon-dense native forests are protected.

Kate Dooley, Research Fellow, School of Geography, Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, The University of Melbourne

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