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Bushfires in New South Wales EARLIER, MORE FREQUENT, MORE DANGEROUS: BUSHFIRES IN NEW SOUTH WALES CLIMATECOUNCIL.ORG.AU Thank you for supporting the Climate Council. The Climate Council is an independent, crowd-funded organisation providing quality information on climate change to the Australian public. Published by the Climate Council of Australia Limited ISBN: 978-1-925573-36-7 (print) 978-1-925573-37-4 (web) © Climate Council of Australia Ltd 2017 This work is copyright the Climate Council of Australia Ltd. All material contained in this work is copyright the Climate Council of Australia Ltd Professor Lesley Hughes except where a third party source is indicated. Climate Councillor Climate Council of Australia Ltd copyright material is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Australia License. To view a copy of this license visit http://creativecommons.org.au. You are free to copy, communicate and adapt the Climate Council of Australia Ltd copyright material so long as you attribute the Climate Council of Australia Ltd and the authors in the following manner: Earlier, More Frequent, More Dangerous: Bushfires in New South Wales by Professor Lesley Hughes and Dr David Alexander. Dr David Alexander Researcher, Climate Council The authors retain sole responsibility for the contents of this report. We would like to thank Martyna Kotowska and Dylan Pursche for their assistance in preparing the report. — Cover image credit: “Bushfire close up at night“ by VanderWolf Images, Shutterstock image library. This report is printed on 100% recycled paper. facebook.com/climatecouncil [email protected] twitter.com/climatecouncil climatecouncil.org.au CLIMATE COUNCIL 1 Contents Key Findings .................................................................................................................................................................................... 2 1. Introduction ............................................................................................................................................................................. 4 2. Bushfire Outlook 2017/2018 ................................................................................................................................................. 5 3. The Climate Change Influence on Bushfires ................................................................................................................. 8 4. Impacts of Bushfires ............................................................................................................................................................ 10 4.1 Health Impacts 11 4.2 Economic Impacts 12 4.3 Environmental Impacts 13 5. Future Projections of Bushfires ........................................................................................................................................14 6. Implications of Increasing Fire Activity .........................................................................................................................16 References 19 Image Credits 23 Fire Danger Rating 24 Preparing for a Bushfire in NSW 25 2 EARLIER, MORE FREQUENT, MORE DANGEROUS: BUSHFIRES IN NEw SOUTH WALES Key Findings 1 2 Bushfires in New South Wales have The 2017/2018 bushfire season mirrors become more frequent and dangerous the long-term trend to increased due to climate change. bushfire risk due to climate change. › Since the 1970s, increasing hot days › Hot, dry conditions have a major influence and heatwaves have increased extreme on bushfires. The 2017 winter in New fire weather across large parts of New South Wales was hot and dry, and was South Wales. followed by an unprecedented hot and dry September. It was the first time on record › Declining cool season rainfall has had a that any location in the state exceeded significant impact on increasing bushfire 40°C in September. risk. Since the mid-1990s, southeast Australia has experienced a 15% decline › ‘Above normal’ fire potential is expected in late autumn and early winter rainfall for much of eastern New South Wales and a 25% decline in average rainfall in during the 2017–18 bushfire season, on April and May. the back of warm, dry June-September weather. › The fire season in southeast Australia has lengthened, reducing opportunities for › The New South Wales Rural Fire Service fuel reduction burning and increasing brought forward the start of the the resource needs of firefighting services. bushfire danger season by one month in nine eastern local government areas. KEY FINDINGS 3 3 4 Bushfires have a major negative In the future, New South Wales is impact on public health, the very likely to experience an increased economy and the environment number of days with dangerous in New South Wales. fire weather. › Bushfire smoke can seriously affect › Fire severity and intensity is expected to human health because it contains increase substantially in coming decades, respiratory irritants, as well as especially in those regions currently most inflammatory and cancer causing affected by bushfires. chemicals. The elderly, infants and › The increasing length of the fire season those with chronic heart or lung diseases is reducing the window of opportunity are at highest risk. Increasing frequency for hazard reduction at the same time and severity of bushfire conditions will as the need for hazard reduction is thus have a flow-on effect to negative becoming greater. health outcomes. › Increased resources for emergency › Bushfire costs in New South Wales are services and fire management agencies likely to more than double by mid-century will be required as fire risk increases. to over $100 million per year. These estimates are conservative, because › As bushfires seasons increasingly overlap they do not factor in climate change. in both Hemispheres, sharing resources, for example firefighting personnel or › Increasing fire frequency is affecting fire bombers, will become increasingly freshwater resources, many plants and impractical. animals, and has ongoing implications for ecosystem health. › Communities, emergency services and health services must keep preparing for a future with increasingly higher bushfire risk. › Tackling climate change through reducing pollution from fossil fuel burning in New South Wales and Australia is critical. climatecouncil.org.au 4 EARLIER, MORE FREQUENT, MORE DANGEROUS: BUSHFIRES IN NEw SOUTH WALES 1. Introduction On the back of Australia’s summer in New South Wales, before record-breaking warm and dry outlining the link between bushfires and winter, particularly in the north climate change. We consider how bushfire and east of the country, dangerous weather is intensifying in the state, and bushfire weather has already what this means for the immediate future. been experienced across much of We explore the impacts of fire on people, New South Wales. As a result, fire property, water supply, biodiversity bans have been in place on many and the economy, before identifying occasions, particularly during the the future implications of bushfires for extreme heat in September where New South Wales fire managers, planners more than 90 bushfires broke and emergency services. rd out on the 23 , including one This report provides an update to the that blocked the Hume Highway previous Climate Council report on bushfire between Canberra and Sydney. risk in New South Wales and the Australian Residents of New South Wales have often Capital Territory. experienced the serious consequences ......................................................................................... of bushfires. In 2013, bushfires in January and October burnt 768,000 hectares of land and destroyed 279 homes. Tragically, two people lost their lives and damages CLIMATE CHANGE were conservatively estimated to be more AND THE NSW/ACT than $180 million. BUSHFIRE THREAT: UPDATE 2016 The New South Wales population has always lived with fire and its consequences, but climate change – driven by the burning of coal, oil and gas – is worsening dangerous fire weather across the state. Long-term global warming, now about 1°C above pre-industrial levels, is increasing temperatures across the CLIMATECOUNCIL.ORG.AU Australian continent. At the same time, a decline in cool season rainfall is contributing to an increased likelihood of more dangerous bushfire conditions by drying fuel. Bushfire weather is becoming harsher. We must think seriously about how to prepare for, and cope with, increasing bushfire risk under a hotter climate. This report begins by describing the bushfire risk this coming spring and Dry, warm conditions have led to a dangerous bushfire season ahead. CHAPTER 02 5 BUSHFIRE OUTLooK 2017/2018 2. Bushfire Outlook 2017/2018 JUNE-SEPTEMBER CLIMATE RECORDS August: › Rainfall was 44% below average. Many heat and low rainfall records were broken in New South Wales from June to › Maximum temperatures were 1.17°C above September in 2017 (Figure 1). As a result, the average across New South Wales. hot, dry conditions have set the scene for a September: dangerous bushfire season ahead. Here are › The average maximum temperature was a selection of records and weather details more than 2°C above average for the state. for this period (BoM 2017a): › Sydney had the driest start to spring June: since observations began in 1858, with › 38 records in regional towns across Observatory Hill recording only 0.2 mm. the state were broken for the driest › Wanaaring in regional New South Wales June on record. set a new state September record of 41.4°C. › New South Wales had its driest June
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