"A class action launched on behalf of young people
everywhere seeks an injunction to stop the Australian Government
approving an extension to Whitehaven's Vickery coal mine, arguing it
will harm young people by exacerbating climate change.
from: nwprotectionadvocacy.com
Key points:
The injunction, an Australian first, is part of a growing wave of climate litigation claims
Rather
than making the claim under environmental law, the class action asserts
Federal Minister Sussan Ley has a common law duty of care for young
people
The
class action argues that by digging up and burning coal, climate change
will be made worse and that will harm young people in the future"
As the Morrison Government rushes to amend national environmental
protection laws, scientists warn a growing number of their colleagues
are being silenced.
A study by the Ecological Society of Australia
claims a third of ecologists and conservation scientists employed by
government and industry had work "unduly modified" and almost half of
those working for government were blocked from releasing their findings.
Their
treatment has renewed calls for the creation of an independent
environmental agency, something the Coalition has ruled out.
The scientific conspiracy!
Featured: Don Driscoll, Professor in Terrestrial Ecology, Deakin University
"Our homes have become sanctuaries — places of refuge in the time of coronavirus. But they can't protect us from all threats.
Analysts
say the houses we've built, and where we've built them, could increase
our future vulnerability as we face the ongoing effects of climate
change.
Analysts fear insurers may withdraw
from areas they don't believe
are profitable.(ABC News: Tim Swanston)
With increased damage to houses through
catastrophic fires, floods and other disasters, the global insurance
market is under increasing stress, and there are fears whole communities
could become impoverished or homeless.
Experts
doubt industry players and governments have fully come to terms with the
issue — and they worry about some of the financial mechanisms insurance
companies have put in place to share the risk.
Too focused on past catastrophes
Insurers
have a short-term focus and often fail to be proactive in assessing
future problems, according to Jason Thistlethwaite, a Canada-based
academic and expert on insurance practice.
He says
while global climate models are forward looking, the actuarial practices
used for risk modelling in the insurance industry are not.
Put bluntly, insurers still spend most of their time looking in the rear-view mirror.
Erosion could cost some homeowners their entire asset, experts warn.(ABC RN: Antony Funnell)
Where
there has been a shift in attitude, though, is among "reinsurers" —
essentially, the insurance companies for insurance companies.
"Reinsurers
are starting to grasp that these extreme events are something known as
correlated risk, meaning that there is a common cause underlying them,"
Professor Thistlethwaite says.
"So, Australia may
have a good year with very few claims in the primary insurance market,
but reinsurance rates may still go up because there is bad flooding in
the Philippines or the United Kingdom, for instance.
"They
are operating at a global scale that allows them to pick up on data
points that provide a much more coherent pattern that shows extreme
weather events are getting worse and contributing to higher losses."
He says that broader, interconnected understanding of
risk is starting to filter down to primary insurers, as they themselves
experience increasing reinsurance costs.
Nevertheless,
he's predicting a rationalisation of the primary insurance market, with
some companies going bust and others simply withdrawing from areas they
don't believe profitable.
Rise of the 'red zones of risk'
Professor
Thistlethwaite says it's already happening in the United States in
regions regularly affected by major climate-related events, such as
hurricanes and tornados.
And it's also beginning to occur in Australia, according to Karl Mallon, director of science at the organisation Climate Risk.
"If
we see emissions continuing in the current direction, the level of
warming continuing in the same direction, and if we continue to see a
sort of blind attitude to what's happening, then our risk will rise to
about one in 10 properties," he says.
"Ninety per
cent of properties may be OK, as in they are still insurable, even
though the costs might be elevated. [But] one in 10 may really cross into the red zone territory."
Early last year the
Insurance Council of Australia accused Dr Mallon of "scaremongering",
but its president Richard Enthoven has since acknowledged that changing
weather systems could potentially make some parts of Australia
"uninsurable".
Dr Mallon cites parts of the Gold
Coast in Queensland, the Central Coast in New South Wales, and West
Lakes in South Australia as regions facing an impending crisis.
Legal
expert Justine Bell-James warns that coastal communities could face a
double hit: not only could their houses become uninsurable, but some
homeowners could lose their entire asset due to erosion."
"Newspaper reports describe temperatures in Bourke reaching 48.9
degrees Celsius on three occasions, and the maximum temperature
remaining above 38C for 24 consecutive days.
As Australia endures a series of intense and record-breaking heatwaves
this summer, the 1896 event is sometimes viewed as evidence that
Australia has always experienced extraordinary heat, and that the
effects of climate change are overblown.
But climate scientists
say that is an oversimplification, and the heatwaves we experience today
are significantly hotter than those in the past."
"The temperature recording methods used in 1896 were flawed
Methods
of recording temperature were not standardised until the early 1900s,
leading to inflated temperature readings before then. The global
standard for temperature measurement includes the use of a Stevenson
screen, which is a white louvred box allowing ventilation and ensuring
thermometers inside are never exposed to the sun.
A Stevenson
screen was not installed in Bourke until August 1908, meaning
temperature readings from before that could be inflated by as much as
2C.
University of Melbourne climate researcher Linden Ashcroft
said thermometers in Bourke were likely placed in sub-standard
conditions in 1896.
"Some thermometers were under verandahs, or they were against stone buildings," she said."
