Category: Austalia

Australian Electrical Grid A Shambles

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Australian Electrical Grid is a Shambles.

Rachel Baxendale, The Australian

h/t Des Moore

More than 200,000 Victorian households had their power cut off yesterday in a bid to protect the state’s energy system from shutting down, as the Andrews government was forced to admit there was not enough power to keep up with soaring demand in sweltering summer heat.

Homes were blacked out, traffic lights across Melbourne were switched off and businesses were forced to close for up to two hours after the Australian Energy Market Operator enforced rolling power outages to make up a 250 megawatt shortfall in supply.

The State Energy Minister (Lily D’Ambrosio) said there would “absolutely” be no blackouts this morning and the rolling blackouts started 90 minutes later.

Welcome to the USS Australia where we hope to make your 150th Birthday Party 0.001 degrees cooler but we can’t predict our electricity grid for the next hour and a half.

Dark ages — get used to it

Read more.

Calmest Australian Cyclone Season Since 1970

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Calmest Since 1970650x366_04261111_image-download

With the official end of the Australian tropical season only days away, the calmest season in decades will come to an end.

The season, which officially runs from 1 November through 30 April, has endured only three named cyclones originating within the Australian Tropical Basin.

Having only three named storms of Category 1 strength or higher in the basin would be the fewest dating back to 1970, according to the Australian Bureau of Meteorology (BOM).

According to Senior Meteorologist Jason Nicholls, “El Niño played an important role in the low activity of the tropical season as tropical development flourished closer to Fiji and Vanuatu and away from Australia.” El Niño occurs when ocean water temperatures rise above normal across the central and eastern Pacific, near the equator which influences global weather patterns.

Heavy ice delays Australian Antarctic icebreaker Aurora Australis

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“The summer Australian Antarctic Division program will have to be modified because its icebreaker the Aurora Australis has been delayed in heavy ice.

The ship was due to return to Hobart more than a week ago after a resupply mission, but it is still navigating through heavy ice about 180 nautical miles off the Davis research station.’

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-11-25/ice-delays-australian-antarctic-icebreaker-aurora-australis/5114778

 

Less Fresh Water in the Arctic and More Rainfall in Australia Leads To Lower Sea Level and Less Ice?

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Could massive amounts of rainfall in Australia have deprived the Arctic of fresh water so there was less sea ice?

NSIDC:  “Water from the Pacific Ocean and several rivers in Russia and Canada provide fresher, less dense water to the Arctic Ocean. So the Arctic Ocean has a layer of cold, fresh water near the surface with warmer, saltier water below. This cold, fresh water layer typically allows more ice growth in the Arctic than the Antarctic.”

NCAR: ” when three atmospheric patterns came together over the Indian and Pacific oceans, they drove so much precipitation over Australia in 2010 and 2011 that the world’s ocean levels dropped measurably.”

UAH says Australia Cooling at -.927C per decade for last 5 years

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UAH is a satellite temperature dataset, developed at the University of Alabama in Huntsville.

Last month UAH added AUST to its satellite data temperature set. AUST is Australia.

According to UAH, Australia is cooling at -.927C per decade over the last 5 years and cooling at -.291C per decade over the last 10 years.

UAH - Last 5 years - AUST

UAH - Last 10 years - AUST