Themission report,based on a visit to the reef by scientists in March,said while action on climate change had been boosted since the election of the Albanese government,Australia does “not provide any clear pathway to avoid significant negative impact” from climate change and urged the government to its goals to align with the Paris target of limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees.
The March visit coincided with a mass coral bleaching event caused by a marine heatwave,which occurred for the first time in a typically cool La Nina period.
The Albanese government has upgraded Australia’s emissions reduction target to 43 per cent target by 2030,a significant boost from the former Morrison government’s goal of 26 per cent by 2030. But this isconsistent with 2 degrees or more of warming. Australia would need to cut its emissions about 70 per cent to act consistently with global action needed to keep warming under 1.5 degrees.
Loading
In the past six years the reef has copped four mass coral bleaching events and the risks to its survival are pressing. A report by the Australian Academy of Sciencessaid if the world warmed by 2 degrees only 1 per cent of corals would survive.
The Australian Institute of Marine Science (AIMS) has listed the outlook for the reef’s health as “very poor” and said in August that theincreased frequency of mass coral bleaching events was “uncharted territory” for the reef following the fourth mass bleaching in seven years.
“In our 36 years of monitoring the condition of the Great Barrier Reef we have not seen bleaching events so close together,” said AIMS chief scientists Paul Hardisty.