Antarctic scientists are calling for urgent action to deal with climate change

Hundreds of Antarctic scientists at an emergency summit in Hobart have issued a statement calling for urgent action to deal with the climate crisis.

Transcript

00:00Over the past week, there's been about 450 polar researchers that have been holding a

00:07conference at the University of Tasmania. It's the first such conference in more than

00:12a decade. And they've described it as an emergency summit. And that's because we've seen some

00:19very rapid and extreme changes taking place in Antarctica in recent times. So there have

00:24been heatwaves where the temperature has been about 40 degrees above average. There's been

00:30record low sea ice levels. Last year, scientists were describing it as a once in seven and

00:36a half million year event. And yet we've seen similar sea ice levels this year again. And

00:42so all of this is a sign of global warming. And that leads to, of course, to sea levels

00:48to rise. And the scientists at this conference have issued a statement saying nowhere on

00:54Earth is there a greater cause for uncertainty in sea level projections than in East Antarctica.

01:00And that's, of course, the area where the Australian Antarctic Territory is. And they

01:05say there's enough ice there, if it were to all melt, to raise global sea levels by 50

01:11metres. And they say that would have immense implications for Australia's infrastructure

01:17and coastline. Here's a little of what one of the researchers had to say.

01:23We throw around the word unprecedented quite a lot in climate science, but it really is

01:28true. We have seen shifts in the sea ice that were beyond our wildest imaginations. We have

01:33seen heatwaves that were 40 degrees warmer than expected weather. We have seen entire

01:39colonies of emperor penguins lose all of their young in a breeding season. To describe it

01:45as anything other than an emergency sells these drastic changes short.

01:50What they want to see is an immediate reduction in carbon in the atmosphere. They say that

01:55unless greenhouse gas emissions can be reduced, it will really lock in some of these potential

02:02sea level rises for future generations. And they also want to see research prioritised

02:08to ensure that we really get a clear picture of what's taking place and what we can expect.

02:14Here's what a couple of the early career researchers who were involved in the drafting of this

02:19new statement had to say.

02:21I think one of the clear things from this conference was that we are approaching some

02:25tipping points that we're not sure whether we can reverse or not. So more funding into

02:30those areas is pretty crucial to understand how it's going to affect our planet.

02:34I feel that there's, although there's lots of tipping points that we don't necessarily

02:39understand completely, we do know enough to say that we do need to protect, we do need

02:46to control our emissions. And for that to happen, it needs to go beyond the walls of

02:53the university. We need to make sure people understand that and really relate to Antarctica

03:00in a way that they see that impacts their future as well.

03:05So those researchers, they're really saying that there's no time to waste when it comes

03:09to taking action in relation to climate change and specifically in relation to Antarctica.

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