Reconstructing Pre-20th Century Rainfall, Temperature and Pressure for South-Eastern Australia Using Palaeoclimate, Documentary and Early Weather Station Data.

Grant number: LP0990151 | Funding period: 2009 - 2013

Completed

Abstract

South-eastern Australia is in the grip of a severe water crisis due to the worst drought in recorded history and increasing temperatures. This landmark project brings together a team of Australia's leading climate scientists, water managers and historians with the common goal of reconstructing south-eastern Australia's climate history. The greatly extended record of annual rainfall and temperature variability will allow better planning for water storage and use, and improved testing of climate model simulations. Improving our understanding of the historical impacts of climate extremes on society will assist with planning for life in a hotter and drier future.

Related publications (15)

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Recent developments in australian climate history

J Gergis, L Ashcroft, D Garden

2018-08-10

There have been considerable advances in historical climatology in Australia over the past decade. Recent interdisciplinary resear..

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Long-term stationarity of El Nino-Southern Oscillation teleconnections in southeastern Australia

Linden Ashcroft, Joelle Gergis, David John Karoly

2016-05-01

The El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO) phenomenon plays a large role in the modulation of Aaustralian rainfall, particularly in t..

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Australasian temperature reconstructions spanning the Last Millennium

J Gergis, R Neukom, AJE Gallant, DJ Karoly

2016-01-01

Multiproxy warm season (September-February) temperature reconstructions are presented for the combined land-ocean region of Austra..

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Increasing the understanding and use of natural archives of ecosystem services, resilience and thresholds to improve policy, science and practice

S Pearson, AJJ Lynch, R Plant, S Cork, K Taffs, J Dodson, S Maynard, J Gergis, P Gell, R Thackway, L Sealie, J Donaldson

2015-02-25

Despite the great potential of palaeo-environmental information to strengthen natural resource policy, science and practical outco..

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A historical climate dataset for southeastern Australia, 1788-1859

Linden Ashcroft, Joelle Gergis, David John Karoly

2014-11-01

<jats:p>There is a significant lack of historical climate data in the Southern Hemisphere compared to the northern latitudes. To a..

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Inter-hemispheric temperature variability over the past millennium

R Neukom, J Gergis, DJ Karoly, H Wanner, M Curran, J Elbert, F González-Rouco, BK Linsley, AD Moy, I Mundo, CC Raible, EJ Steig, T Van Ommen, T Vance, R Villalba, J Zinke, D Frank

2014-01-01

The Earths climate system is driven by a complex interplay of internal chaotic dynamics and natural and anthropogenic external for..

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Southeastern Australian climate variability 1860-2009: A multivariate analysis

L Ashcroft, DJ Karoly, J Gergis

2014-01-01

Historical datasets of instrumental temperature, rainfall and atmospheric pressure observations have recently been developed for s..

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Rainfall variations in south-eastern Australia part 1: Consolidating evidence from pre-instrumental documentary sources, 1788-1860

C Fenby, J Gergis

2013-11-30

This study fills an important gap in south-eastern Australia's climate record by compiling qualitative historical data from the ti..

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Rainfall variations in south-eastern Australia part 2: A comparison of documentary, early instrumental and palaeoclimate records, 1788-2008

J Gergis, L Ashcroft

2013-11-30

In part 1 of this study, Fenby and Gergis (Fenby C, Gergis J. 2012. A rainfall history of south-eastern Australia Part 1: comparin..

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Paleoclimate data-model comparison and the role of climate forcings over the past 1500 years

SJ Phipps, HV Mcgregor, J Gergis, AJE Gallant, R Neukom, S Stevenson, D Ackerley, JR Brown, MJ Fischer, TD Van Ommen

2013-09-23

The past 1500 years provide a valuable opportunity to study the response of the climate system to external forcings. However, the ..

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Southern Hemisphere high-resolution palaeoclimate records of the last 2000 years

R Neukom, J Gergis

2012-05-01

This study presents a comprehensive assessment of high-resolution Southern Hemisphere (SH) paleoarchives covering the last 2000 ye..

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On the long-term context of the 1997-2009 'Big Dry' in South-Eastern Australia: Insights from a 206-year multi-proxy rainfall reconstruction

J Gergis, AJE Gallant, K Braganza, DJ Karoly, K Allen, L Cullen, R D'Arrigo, I Goodwin, P Grierson, S McGregor

2012-04-01

This study presents the first multi-proxy reconstruction of rainfall variability from the mid-latitude region of south-eastern Aus..

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Temperature variations of southeastern Australia, 1860-2011

L Ashcroft, D Karoly, J Gergis

2012-01-01

This study presents the first quality-controlled dataset of surface air temperature observations for 1860-1909 across southeastern..

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An experimental streamflow reconstruction for the River Murray, Australia, 1783-1988

AJE Gallant, J Gergis

2011-05-02

We present an experimental reconstruction of River Murray streamflow to assess present-day variations in the context of the past t..

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The weather of the First Fleet voyage to Botany Bay, 1787-1788

J Gergis, P Brohan, R Allan

2010-12-01

University of Melbourne Researchers