Bleached coral on Lizard Island, Queensland – Image: WWF Australia/Alexander Vail
El Nino: UNESCO’s draft decision on the Great Barrier Reef’s World Heritage status makes clear Australia must do more to build the Reef’s resilience and protect it from climate change, says the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) Australia.
The UN agency’s decision, released today, means Australia must improve its emissions reduction ambition, implement stronger laws to protect trees in Reef catchments and ensure the timely removal of commercial gill nets from Reef waters by mid-2027.
UNESCO also asked Australia to return to the World Heritage Committee with a progress report in 2028. If the Australian and Queensland governments can’t demonstrate significant progress on implementing its recommendations, the Committee could place the Reef on its list of World Heritage sites ‘in Danger’.
“With a potential ‘super El Niño’ looming this summer, there’s never been a more urgent time to cut emissions and boost the resilience of the Reef,” said WWF-Australia’s Head of Oceans, Richard Leck.
“Our governments have a lot of work to do in the next two years to give the Reef the best chance of withstanding the pressures ahead.”
El Niño summers pose a grave threat to the health of the Reef. Higher than average ocean temperatures can cause heat stress for corals, which can lead to mass coral bleaching events.
“The Reef is resilient, but it needs our help as temperatures become more extreme,” said Mr. Leck.
“Australia needs to rapidly reduce emissions to do its fair share to stabilise global temperature rise to 1.5 degrees.”
Mr Leck said stopping pollution from flowing into the Reef is one of the most important ways to build its resilience.
UNESCO’s draft decision (page 79).
El Nino officially declared for New Zealand
Earth Sciences New Zealand has confirmed that El Niño conditions have been reached in the tropical Pacific and are expected to strongly influence New Zealand’s weather into 2027. El Nino is expected to intensify into one of the strongest on record, according to Earth Sciences NZ.
El Niño is a global phenomenon, originating with the warming of ocean temperatures in the eastern and central equatorial Pacific. Historically this has resulted in a New Zealand spring dominated by westerly quarter winds (southwest to northwest), typically bringing drier than usual conditions for eastern and northern areas of both islands and wetter than usual conditions for the western and lower South Island.
Image: Earth Sciences NZ
“Observations of sea surface temperatures in the east-central tropical Pacific show the hallmarks of a historically strong event, which is also echoed by the modelling,” says Chris Brandolino, Earth Sciences New Zealand Chief Scientist Weather and Seasonal Forecasting. A sea surface temperature (SST) difference from average, known as an ‘anomaly’, of 1.5°C is a marker of a ‘strong’ El Niño; if the anomaly reaches at least 2.0°C that’s considered very strong, sometimes termed a ‘super’ El Niño.
The top five strongest El Nino events (1972, 1982, 1991, 1997, 2015) all had SST anomalies near or slightly above 2.5°C. The SST anomaly recorded for this event has already exceeded 1.0°C and will continue to increase. “At the very least we’re expecting this event to rival the intensity of these historical top five events, but it has considerable potential to exceed them all,” says Brandolino.
Likely impacts on New Zealand’s weather this spring Earth Sciences New Zealand and MetService meteorologist Jon Tunster says it is important to recognise that New Zealand’s weather is influenced by many factors. These include the Indian Ocean Dipole (shifting ocean temperatures in the Indian Ocean), regional SSTs, occasional influences from Antarctica, and climate change. “There’s more to it than El Nino, or even Super El Nino, but this El Nino event is shaping up to have a major influence, potentially from September onwards.”
“As we’ve seen with the previous El Nino events, the overwhelming majority of long-range models are favouring drier than usual conditions for northern and eastern areas of New Zealand, while western regions – especially of the South Island – are likely to see increased rainfall.”
NAN/WWF/Earth Sciences NZ 05-07-26
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