Climate News: Water talk will ignite the conversation; Experts urge renewed action on future of Murray-Darling Basin

The Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering (ATSE) has today urged a suite of actions and investments to protect the future of the Murray-Darling Basin in the face of climate change, which is threatening the river’s health and sustainability. In a new essay series A thriving Murray-Darling Basin in 50 years: Actions in the face of climate change, ATSE urges more investment in technologies to monitor the river for climate impacts and in sustained governance with regional and rural communities at the centre, coupled with evolving our agriculture industry in the face of decreased water availability and accepted water-sharing policies. The essay series highlights the vibrant, thriving potential of the Basin if sustainably managed for the benefit of communities and the environment. To achieve this, it recommends reinstating a body to provide independent objective policy advice on national water management, including for the Murray-Darling Basin, to help guide consistent national data-driven decision-making. ATSE President Katherine Woodthorpe AO FTSE (pictured) said the future of the Murray-Darling Basin is recognised to be at severe risk. That comprehensive action across Federal, State and Territory Governments will be decisive in safeguarding its biodiversity, and social and economic importance to Australia. "Essays address climate change in the Murray-Darling Basin"; "Australia could play a key role: what a key Paris Agreement negotiator thinks about our climate future"; "Poorer nations must be transparent over climate spending, says Cop29 leader"; "Weather tracker: Mexico swelters under season’s first heatwave"; "Oil giant plans to move 60,000 tonnes of steel, rig waste to UN-listed wetlands"; "A Grampians town’s remarkable recovery after ‘the beast’ burnt through"; "Energy Efficiency Council". "YIMBY: Community composting for connection and climate action"; "The Loudest Guys in the Room: How the Fossil Fuel Industry Warps the Information Ecosystem"; "In ‘Silent Spring,’ Rachel Carson Described a Fictional, Bucolic Hamlet, Much Like Her Hometown. Now, There’s a Plastics Plant Under Construction 30 Miles Away"; "A Plastics Plant Promised Pennsylvania Prosperity, but to Some Residents It’s Become a ‘Shockingly Bad’ Neighbor"; "Wildfire smoke a threat to already endangered orangutans"; "Why some corals are better off dead"; "Reflections on being an Earthling"; "The EPA’s Carbon Crackdown Is Finally Here"; "We aim to call Government and Industry to action . . . . .Charter 29"; "Curious Kids: why do trees have bark?"; "Weather tracker: torrential rainstorms cause death and destruction in Brazil"; "Here’s why so many Republicans won’t buy EVs"; "Making merry: how we brought Melbourne’s Merri Creek back from pollution, neglect and weeds"; "Buddha taught us to be happy with less. How does this apply to the climate crisis?"; "3 energy questions hang over EPA’s carbon rule"; "Sometimes, to Make an Electric Car Better, You’ve Got to Make It a Little Worse"; "Climate Change Is Making Your Seasonal Allergies Worse"; "As the Environmental Crisis Worsens, So Too Does the Safety of Journalists Covering It"; "‘Like wildfires underwater’: Worst summer on record for Great Barrier Reef as coral die-off sweeps planet"; "Federal Court hears closing arguments in Torres Strait Islanders' climate change case"; "Floods in southern Brazil kill at least 75 people over 7 days, with 103 people missing"; "‘We’re looking at losing 20% of Olympic nations’: how the climate crisis is changing sport"; "First ever cyclone confronts flood-hit Kenya"; "Over 100 temperature records in Vietnam broken in April as heatwave scorches"; "There's a soundtrack to our coral reefs and scientists are hopeful it can encourage coral regrowth"; "The cleanest air in the world is at Tasmania's Kennaook/Cape Grim. It's helping solve a climate puzzle"