Hobart

Seminar Abstract

Monday 6 April 2009, 2.00pm (Tas time)
CSIRO Auditorium, Hobart

Peter G Baines
Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering
University of Melbourne
and
QUEST, Department of Earth Sciences
University of Bristol, UK

The Attribution of Causes of Current Decadal Droughts

It is shown that the current decadal drought (or rainfall decrease) in Southeast Australia (essentially the Murray-Darling Basin) since the mid-1990s is coincident with corresponding rainfall decreases in the continental United States, Hawaii, equatorial Africa and the South American Altiplano. There are corresponding increases in Northwest Australia and the Amazon basin, and these are all part of a global pattern of variability that includes sea surface temperature (SST), atmospheric motion, and a general increase in rainfall in the equatorial oceanic tropics and a decrease in the subtropics and mid-latitudes. The causes of this pattern of variability are investigated by taking SST as a representative variable, and examining the correlation of this pattern over a much longer time period with identifiable patterns of SST. The procedure gives quantitative estimates that show that the current drought is attributable to a mixture of global warming, the Atlantic meridional oscillation and Pacific processes, and numbers will be given in the presentation.

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Location:
CSIRO = Marine Laboratories Auditorium, Castray Esplanade, Hobart

For further information, or to schedule a seminar, contact:
To schedule a seminar, contact:
Clothilde Langlais, (Oceanographic seminars) CSIRO Marine and Atmospheric Research (03) 6232 5399
Natalie Kelly, (Biology/Modelling seminars) CSIRO Marine and Atmospheric Research 0438 452 483
Jillian Enraght-Moony, (seminar administrator) CSIRO Marine and Atmospheric Research (03) 6232 5320
Communications Manager, Antarctic Climate and Ecosystems CRC (03) 6226 2265
Margaret Hazelwood, Institute of Antarctic and Southern Ocean Studies (IASOS) University of Tasmania (03) 6226 2971

Last updated 8/12/09