ACF branch warns on foreshore strategy

A draft foreshore strategy for Brisbane Waters is "flawed" and could lead to Gosford Council facing legal liability if it fails to take a precautionary approach to climate change predictions, the Central Coast branch of the Australian Conservation Foundation has warned.

The branch has told council that the strategy had failed to adequately take into account the effects of climate change, which could have serious consequences for low-lying areas such as the Woy Woy Peninsula.

"The study has seriously under-estimated potential sea-level rise and has totally ignored predictions of more frequent and intense coastal storms," said branch president Mr Mark Snell.

"Given that the study identifies ocean storms as the single most important factor affecting flood levels, it is surprising that it has failed to take predicted changes to their frequency and intensity into account."

Mr Snell suggested that the consultants should redraft the report responding to the issues raised in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Fourth Assessment Report, among other scientific material.

The submission stated that despite attributing one figure (300mm) for sea-level rise to the IPCC, the draft foreshore strategy did not appear to have taken any of the other IPCC statements about sea level rise and storm frequency and intensity into account.

The ACF branch stated: "For example, the IPCC report specifically excludes melting of polar ice from its estimates of mean sea level rise.

"In relation to polar ice, the IPCC estimated a sea level rise of seven metres (7000mm) with the melting of the Greenland ice sheet alone.

"There are very few parts of the Woy Woy Peninsula that are much above this elevation.

"The IPCC predicts that this will occur if global warming reaches and stays above 1.9 degrees warmer than pre-Industrial levels."

Mr Snell said the study had not seriously considered the Newcastle storm of June last year "which brought wild weather to Gosford and resulted in major flooding, with consequent threats to water, sewerage and electricity infrastructure".

Mr Snell said: "As it was, this storm caused widespread electricity blackouts, cut land-based and radio communications, as well as causing widespread local flooding.

"Water and sewerage systems broke down as power was cut to pumping stations, either because powerlines had been brought down or flood levels had been under-estimated in the siting of the pumping stations.

"Had this storm been centred on Gosford rather than Newcastle, the damage and other local consequences could be expected to have been of at least the same disastrous proportions as suffered in Newcastle and surrounding areas.

"It is intense storms of this nature that are predicted to become both more frequent and more intense."

In its submission, the branch compared the Woy Woy Peninsula with New Orleans, stating that the Peninsula was "in a similarly vulnerable position, being a low-lying coastal sandplain accommodating as much as one quarter of Gosford's population with limited evacuation potential".

Press release, 19 Feb 2008 Mark Snell, Australian Conservation Foundation