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Within less than the span of a lifetime, Sydney could resemble a desert town like Alice Springs, or even the apocalyptic landscape from Cormac McCarthy's new novel, The Road.
Scorched by temperatures five degrees higher than today, lacking drinking water and yet battered by rising seas and ravaged by bush fires of the ferocity that last month blackened huge areas of Victoria and Tasmania, one of the world's most spectacular cities could be virtually uninhabitable.
So suggests a scientific report on climate change commissioned by the New South Wales government.
The report, which forecasts a 40 per cent drop in rainfall by 2070, presses hard on the heels of the shock announcement by Queensland's Premier that from next December state residents stand to drink recycled sewerage. |
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| Along with the US, Australia still refuses to sign the Kyoto protocol |
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Tomorrow, Australia - which along with America still refuses to sign the Kyoto protocol - receives a further doomsday warning, with the publication of a UN study by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. This predicts that in 30 years the Barrier Reef could well be dead, a victim of rising sea temperatures coupled with bleaching of the fragile coral.
Much as I'd like to accuse these reports of hysterical misrepresentation, I find I can't. Arriving last week in Tasmania, I'm able to vouchsafe that this normally temperate state is enduring its most savage drought in living memory.
The fields and vineyards are the colour of the camels I once saw near Ayer's Rock. Snakebites are on the rise, as copperheads and tiger-snakes creep closer to human habitation in search of water. Last night, coming out to watch a comet that had appeared from nowhere, I scattered ten wallabies cropping the grass. A year ago, these timid creatures never came near the house. 
FIRST POSTED FEBRUARY 1, 2007
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