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An Australian is to take charge of the troubled $100 billion Green Climate Fund, in a move that indicates Australia is not completely out of touch on climate change and renewable energy. But is it developing one language on climate for the international stage, and another for the toxic and partisan domestic market?

After five years of failed negotiations, conservations are hopeful Russia is prepared to make a deal to protect the Ross Sea and East Antarctica

An international agreement to protect some of Antarctica’s unique and pristine marine ecosystems could be reached within a fortnight, with scientists and conversationists hopeful of a breakthrough after five years of failed negotiations.

Delegates from 24 nations and the European Union gathered in Hobart on Monday to commence two weeks of talks at the annual meeting of the Commission for the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources (CCAMLR).

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Big week for NEM as Hazelwood decision looms. Meanwhile, electricity prices in NSW jump as coal generator goes off-line.

Dan Hoey, an angler from Port Fairy, a coastal town in Victoria, Australia, was out fishing with his brother and a client when he noticed a great white shark circling his boat. Video captured by Hoey’s chartered fishing business, Salty Dog Charters, shows him fending off the shark with a household broom

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This week the Water Industry Operators Association of Australia (WIOA) stages the Best Tap Water in Australia competition in Marysville, Victoria. The winner could take out the global contest.

Tritium has announced it will showcase three new chargers on its stand (A5-309) at eCarTec in Munich (18-20 October).

For the first time, the public will be able to explore beneath the sails of the world’s most famous house to find out how this pioneering green building is making itself more environmentally friendly.

World Energy Council gives out clear message on move away from fossil fuels, but the fossil fuel industry wasn't listening.

Unpacking the unruly exchange between Elon Musk and the head of a struggling US coal company.

Tracey Lines has joined the CEFC to help accelerate the development of clean energy investment opportunities in north Queensland.

Neighbours building power stations together, renters having access to clean energy and families taking control of their electricity supply is the future of Australia’s power industry.

The first of the massive – biggest in Australia – wind turbine blades arrive for NSW 175MW White Rock wind farm.

Construction of the UK's new £200m polar research ship, the RRS Sir David Attenborough, formally begins on Monday at the Cammell Laird yard on Merseyside.

Medicines classified as ‘critically important in human medicine’ appear to be in frequent use, says European Medicines Agency

Use of some of the strongest antibiotics available to treat life-threatening infections has risen to record levels on European farms, new data shows.

The report reinforces concerns about the overuse of antibiotics on farms, following revelations from the Guardian of the presence of the superbug MRSA in UK-produced meat, in imported meat for sale in UK supermarkets, and on British farms.

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ACT Labor government returned, possibly with help of Greens, leaving no doubt about future of 100% renewable energy target.

Originally published in the Manchester Guardian on 17 October 1916

Grey clouds, like wisps of smoke, raced yesterday across a sullen, leady sky, and the roaring woods scattered their bronzed leaves for the savage wind to play with. Then the scud came, rain wind-driven in blinding sheets, forcing the cattle under the lee of the hedge and rattling on the thatched stack like hail. But soon all changed; the rain stopped, the sky cleared, and the sun found a gap through which it could shine cheerfully; the sheep in the stubbing shook themselves, showering rainbow-tinted drops from their heavy fleeces, and a few larks, rising some fifty feet or so above their chirruping comrades, sang joyfully. In the wood the bracken is yellow or brown, withering fast, but red campions still flower abundantly and there are blossoms on the brambles; these will never fruit, and many of the still red berries cannot ripen unless the sun has more continuous power.

The wind-lashed mere was flecked with white-capped waves, which broke in light spray even against the low-sunk bodies of the grebes and in actual foam against the bluff breasts of the sooty coots. In the shelter of the western wood were four herons, two on the swaying branches, two on mooring stumps, half opening their great wings occasionally when a fiercer gust than usual disturbed their balance; but a score of martins – young birds, too – continued their incessant fly-hunt, skimming this way or that, indifferent to wind or rain, and ready to nip at any gnat or small fly which ventured from its leafy shelter in the fitful gleams of sunshine.

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Over the weekend, more than 170 countries signed an accord in Rwanda that will see the damaging synthetic greenhouse gases usually found in refrigerators and car air conditioners gradually curbed over the next 30 years.

A bar-tailed godwit on the mudflats may be on her way from the Arctic to sub-Saharan Africa. But she’s a lightweight compared to her New Zealand cousins

A long-billed, long-legged wader stands on the edge of the mud, waiting for the tide to recede so she can begin to feed. Nothing about her stands out: she isn’t strikingly pied like the avocets; she doesn’t have the curlew’s impossibly long, curved bill; and she isn’t flying around while yelling a frantic, urgent call like the redshanks.

Yet she has a far better story to tell than any of them. For she is a bar-tailed godwit: one of the greatest of all the bird world’s global travellers. She has already flown here to the river Parrett, that muddy river flowing into the Bristol Channel, from her breeding grounds far to the north – somewhere on the Arctic tundra in Scandinavia or Northern Russia.

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Tropical Cyclone Carlos approaches Western Australia in February 2011. NASA Goddard Space Flight Center/Flickr, CC BY

Northern Australia is likely to experience an average or above-average number of tropical cyclones this summer, according to the Bureau’s annual Tropical Cyclone Season Outlook, issued last week. Given current climate drivers, that means we’re likely to see 11 or more tropical cyclones in the Australian region, and typically around four of those will cross the coastline.

The season will almost certainly be more active than the last. And that means it’s time to prepare, because the likelihood of damage from a tropical cyclone is high in any season.

Last year was certainly nothing like a normal season, so you don’t want to be caught out. The Australian region saw only three tropical cyclones in total (easily beating the old record minimum of five set in the El Niño years of 1987 and 2006 from our data back to 1969-70), none reached severe status (Category 3 or above; this has never occurred) and only one crossed the coast (the equal lowest number on record).

But why do we expect such a different season this time around?

Tracking cyclones

When a cyclone develops, the Bureau issues short-term weather forecasts on the cyclone’s likely track and strength. But for the tropical cyclone season as a whole, we can only look at the chances of more or less cyclones than average forming in Australian waters because cyclones and their tracks are so sensitive to subtle and fine-scale changes in the atmosphere and ocean.

When considering how many tropical cyclones may form over a season, we currently use a statistical model that considers the long-term relationship between cyclones and the state of El Niño or La Niña (properly known as El Niño–Southern Oscillation or ENSO). This particularly focuses on ocean temperatures and atmospheric circulation over the tropical Pacific Ocean.

The model uses the Southern Hemisphere Best Track Cyclone database. This historical record extends back to 1969 and is jointly-maintained by the Bureau, Météo France (La Reunion), Fiji Meteorological Service and Meteorological Service of New Zealand. These four agencies are assigned by the World Meteorological Organization to issue cyclone forecasts in the southern hemisphere.

What makes a cyclone?

Tropical cyclones form in regions with very warm surface waters — generally greater than 26℃. The location of this warm water in the tropical Pacific Ocean and around Australia’s northern coast is affected by ENSO.

During El Niño years the warmest water in the tropics (and associated tropical weather) tends to be located away from Australia, in the eastern tropical South Pacific. In La Niña years, this warm water tends to be located in Coral Sea, between Australia and the Solomon Islands.

Plots of observed cyclone density in the southern hemisphere with ENSO phase. The observed density of cyclones during La Niña years is subtracted from the observed density during El Niño years. Australia Bureau of Meteorology

The image above shows that during El Niño years, cyclones are more likely to occur away from Australia, closer to the dateline and in the eastern south Pacific, as well as in the western Indian Ocean.

This is why 2015 - which was also one of the strongest El Niño events on record, arguably behind only 1982–83 and 1997–98 - resulted in such a quiet tropical cyclone season for Australia. It is also why the eastern Pacific at the same time experienced its second most active (eastern) Pacific Hurricane season on record.

Cyclones for Christmas

Conversely, during La Niña years, cyclones are more likely to form in the western Pacific/Coral Sea, and in the eastern Indian Ocean. As La Niña also tends to bring warmer-than-average waters around Australia’s coastline, the Australian region experiences more cyclones overall. Of course ocean temperatures are just one factor that drives the formation of cyclones. Changes in the atmosphere also encourage tropical cyclones, including higher humidity and more favourable winds.

Because tropical cyclones form closer to the coast during La Niña years, and there tends to be more winds guiding them towards land in some areas, there is a greater chance of more cyclones making landfall. The first crossing also typically comes earlier. History shows that, on average, the first tropical cyclone to make landfall during a La Niña year is around December 10, more than two weeks earlier than the average date across all cyclone seasons; December 25. Typically, Australia’s western coastline sees the first crossing of the year.

The record number of tropical cyclones to cross the coast occurred in the La Niña season of 1970–71, when eight crossed the Australian coastline. The most cyclones on record for an Australian season were in the La Niña summer of 1973–74 and the neutral 1983–84, when 18 tropical cyclones formed. This highlights why a benign season like 2015–16 should not make us complacent.

As this season starts, ENSO is neutral. But a La Niña “watch” is current, meaning a La Niña certainly cannot be ruled out before the end of the year.

The latest observations show the Pacific Ocean has several indicators that have exceeded La Niña thresholds. El Niño and La Niña develop slowly, and likewise their impacts don’t appear suddenly.

With warmer water around Australia’s northern coastline – a classic La Niña-like pattern – the odds rise of an above-average tropical cyclone season.

The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond the academic appointment above.

No amount of spin or legal obfuscation can reconcile the UK government’s clamour for shale gas with its obligations as enshrined in the Paris climate change agreement. Consequently, when the UK’s communities secretary, Sajid Javid, gave the go-ahead for fracking in Lancashire (Report, 7 October), he was making a clear statement that the government has no interest in abiding by either the spirit or the maths of the Paris agreement.

Shale gas is a high carbon energy source. When used for generating electricity its emissions of carbon dioxide are about 30-90 times higher than the full lifecycle emissions of either renewables or nuclear. Given the rapid phase-out of the UK’s existing coal power stations, shale gas will not be produced at sufficient scale and in the necessary timeframe for it to be a substitute for coal.

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