Australia faces worsening extreme weather events latest BoM and CSIRO climate report

Extreme weather events including torrential downpours, searing heat and dangerous bushfire conditions are all getting worse across Australia, with even more challenging events to come, according to the latest snapshot of the nation’s climate.

The continent is now 1.47C hotter than it was in 1910 and sea levels around the coastline are rising at an accelerating rate, according to the 2022 State of the Climate report, a series released every second year.

Many of the changes are being driven by rising levels of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere caused mostly by the burning of fossil fuels.

The report, published by the Bureau of Meteorology and CSIRO, provides a snapshot of changes on land and ocean, including temperature, rainfall, storms and droughts.

The environment minister, Tanya Plibersek, said the report was “sobering reading” and the science minister, Ed Husic, said it “reinforces the urgent need for action on climate change”.

Research director of the Climate Science Centre at CSIRO, Jaci Brown, said: “There are no surprises here and the story hasn’t changed. It’s…