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Wednesday, 10 November 2004 MEDIA RELEASE - HEAD OFFICE Will dry times in south-east Australia continue?Dry times in south-east Australia over the past seven years involve elements of both climate change and natural variability, an Australian Bureau of Meteorology researcher says. That is Bertrand Timbal's preliminary conclusion from comparing projections of rainfall from global climate change models with actual rainfall since 1996. Bertrand used a statistical "downscaling" technique developed with the support of the Australian Greenhouse Office. It can create small-scale or "point" regional data from the broad-scale global models of the atmosphere (diagram). Meteorologists say the recent trend affecting rainfall in south-east Australia (rain map) is reminiscent of that observed in south-west Western Australia in the 1960s and 1970s, where declining rainfall has been linked to changes in large-scale weather patterns. The downscaling technique was first applied in studies of declining WA rainfall. "While we have linked observations of reduced rainfall to large-scale shifts in the circulation affecting southern Australia, the short time scales mean it is not possible to attribute this solely to climate change. Normal variability cannot be ruled out," Bertrand says. Abstract: www.bom.gov.au/announcements/media_releases/ho/20041110bt.pdf FREE DAY REGISTRATION FOR MEDIA PARTICIPANTS Further information: Program: http://www.bom.gov.au/events/anzcf2004/program_1.html |
