Landing on Ballina’s flooded runway, Climate College on the Road was given a bird’s eye view of local flooding in the Northern Rivers. Twelve early career professionals from the Climate Systems Hub had travelled to the region for a week-long field-based experience to build skills and awareness in interdisciplinary collaboration and community engagement. Our arrival into rainfall and local flooding was a small glimpse of the trauma and challenges faced in the region.
A small glimpse of the trauma and challenges faced in the region.
The Climate Early College was established by the Climate Systems Hub to support the next generation of climate science and climate change adaptation experts. Co-led by Sarah Boulter, Ailie Gallant and Lucy Wesson, we deliver online monthly webinars and in-person opportunities. Climate College on the Road was designed for our ‘Fellows’ – members of the College who are employed or funded by the hub.
The Northern Rivers District of NSW has experienced more than its fair share of climate-related disasters and damage. Lismore, built on the confluence of 2 rivers, was originally built as a logging town, with the rivers providing the means of moving logs downstream. Its location means Lismore experiences frequent floods. In 2022, the region was devastated by unprecedented flooding. The Wilson River in Lismore reached 14.4m and was at the heart of the devastation, but many surrounding towns, homes and businesses were flooded or damaged by landslides. Towns were cut-off for weeks. People were left homeless. Many remain in temporary accommodation to date.
“The fact that Lismore got flooded to a height of 14 plus meters was beyond my comprehension when I first heard about it. Visiting the flood-affected sites made me see for myself that implications of climate change might be coming on faster than we think and more catastrophic than we are prepared for.” Pallavi Goswami, Monash University
Early career researchers on the bus
On the coast, a different challenge is being felt. Development of popular coastal towns like Byron Bay have always built against the natural rhythms of sea and sand movement. But sea-level rise is posing a threat to these communities that will exacerbate in the future in response to the changing climate. Coastal erosion is a major issue Byron Bay is dealing with. The net loss of sand at Belongil is already causing difficulties for beachfront properties. While a planned retreat would be the most logical step, it is difficult to achieve and complex to deal with.
The College connected with local community groups, council, state government and Traditional Owners, visiting sites of disaster recovery, erosion and biodiversity at risk, and projects restoring and managing saltmarsh, estuaries, forests, reducing flood risk, land buybacks and coastal protection.
The College Fellows reflect here on what they experienced.
The utility of science
A common thread heard throughout the trip was the role of science in helping make decisions in the face of climate change. But perhaps unsettlingly for a group of early career climate researchers, we consistently heard people dismiss the need for more climate science – at least in its current form. The latest model is not providing answers to what the community values and the dispassionate presentation of scientific advice steeped in uncertainty was leaving people feeling unheard and unseen.
In Lismore, a 10m high levee was built after the floods in 2005. At the time it was considered sufficient to prevent any further catastrophic flooding of the region. The floods of 2022 exceeded this level by over 4m. It demonstrates the unprecedented risks intensifying extreme events bring. Science today needs to contribute more through cross-discipline collaboration that includes scientists, engineers, government bodies, decision-makers, social scientists, impact modellers, designers, planners, community leaders, etc., to actively engage in rethinking adaptation and working out sustainable and resilient mitigation solutions for such disasters. A glimpse of this was seen in the transformative work happening at the Living Lab Northern Rivers. Their work promotes dialogues between scientists and stakeholders to build a vision for the future of Lismore. It was hopeful to see people beginning to think about nature-based solutions instead of conventional hardcore disaster management infrastructural solutions.
Learning at the Living Lab
The college members reflected on traditional academic ways of working and the recurrent emphasis on academic outputs, such as scientific papers. While it is often discussed by universities, this really emphasised a need for an institutional shift away from locking up scientific knowledge in academic journals and measuring academic merit as the number of papers published / H index. As early career scientists we’d love to invest in creating outputs that can be readily used by practitioners without putting our career progress on the line. Less of a concern for the social scientists among us, but still the metric for success.
While visiting Namabunda Farm an Indigenous owned and managed property this was put to us as ‘scientists writing love letters to other scientists’. The message, that scientific publications are inaccessible for the general population to read, and the challenge to our group to find ways to talk to and work with people on the ground.
“I do mostly data driven work. When we are delivering scientific information, we need to keep in mind the “so what” question: who will use it and how can we make it more accessible and useful?” Lynn Zhong, BoM.
The College was also able to see how science and modelling was being used, and some of the challenges authorities face. For example, NEMA has engaged CSIRO to better understand flood risk in the Northern Rivers region, which includes developing a hydrological model for the Richmond River catchment. From a scientific perspective, this is fairly conventional. However, the work is still ongoing, and the government must make decisions without it. Many locals remain in a state of uncertainty 2 years after the floods. So, it seems in the case of Lismore the science is reactive rather than proactive, despite the area historically known to be at risk of floods. This had us thinking about the role of ‘trigger’ events in driving adaptation.
The Byron Shire council has been wrestling with the threat posed by sea-level rise and coastal erosion for many decades. Recently, an external consultancy had been engaged to model the risk of future coastal hazards. We were interested to see some of the staff comfortable using that scientific information relating to 1-in-10/20/50 year hazards when considering how to adapt to risks out to the end of the century. On-the-ground we saw how the council was working to address both flooding and coastal hazard risks through construction of a wetland, improving drainage, using an intermittently closed and open lagoon, and beach reprofiling/revegetation.
“It was an eye-opener during our mini think-tank exercise to come to the realisation that qualitative rather than quantitative solutions were sought by the Reconstruction Authority to the question of ‘how do we communicate the risk/impacts of compound events.” Pardeep Pall, University of Melbourne
“The trip and the conversations we had solidified the role of science in my mind as one small tool in what is needed to solve complex, real-world challenges. Science can sometimes help us refine and understand the problem some more, and every now and then can develop new options or improve the delivery of solutions. But on its own, it misses the mark in terms of understanding the problem. In addition, we learned that seeing science as the be-all-and-end-all has never been successful in developing solutions that actually work.” Claire Mason, CSIRO
Community responding to disaster and building resilience
In terms of disasters, emergencies, and extreme events, the College learnt the biggest predictor of resilience is the strength of connection within the community. From a financial point of view, the best return on investment across the entire emergency management cycle is investing in community preparedness.
“It was great to see the community resilience after a disaster such as the 2022 floods in Lismore. Enthusiasm and hope to adapt was bringing everyone together to continue and not give up.” Hanna Heidemann, University of Melbourne.
The College gained an insight into the breadth of people and organisations involved in disaster response and adaptation, including scientists, experts, government at all levels, local communities, First Nations Peoples. But this was not one whole coordinated effort.
“We saw a mismatch between disaster response and adaptation. The implementation of housing buybacks and efforts of the reconstruction authority were aiming for adaptation. The community were focused on disaster response.” Tia Brullo, University of Melbourne.
From the community perspective, it makes sense that anyone impacted by the 2022 flood should be offered a buyback, and this wasn’t always the case. Decisions were made on long-term historical risk, rather than the footprint of what was considered an ‘outlier’ event. This was clearly a difficult reality of making decisions on what to adapt to.
“We encountered a diversity of opinions on how to respond post disaster. From whether Lismore CBD should stay and be prepared for future floods to moving the centre of Lismore. People outside government see the government as stuck. But government people were clearly passionate and genuinely wanting to solve issues and support community.” John Burley, ANU
Complexity
Ultimately the week really emphasised the reality that climate change adaptation is a complex social issue, and that the climate science can only take us so far in decision making. The reality of livelihoods and attachment to place paint a different story in every location visited.
“My biggest takeaway from the trip was an understanding of just how complex climate adaptation can be on the ground. I had always assumed that what the science tells us is the best solution is the obvious thing to do, but I now know that this isn’t always the case. You can’t underestimate people’s attachment to places of significance even if it doesn’t always make sense. If the community doesn’t like the solution you come up with, then it isn’t going to be a good solution! Good climate adaptation has to take into consideration the needs and wants of the community, and science can play a role by empowering the community with information (in an easily understandable format) to make their decisions.”Katie Quail, UNSW
Learning from each other
The final words come from Olly Dove reflecting on the value of the trip.
“As someone new to the field of climate adaptation – and even climate change itself – the Climate College on the Road proved to be an invaluable experience for me. Coming from a background of seabird ecology, I know little about the field, and having the opportunity to learn about climate adaptation in such a practical, tangible way was hugely beneficial to place into context the concepts and ideas that I have been learning about since starting my new position. It was a huge privilege to meet the local communities and landowners that had been affected by extreme weather events. I’m very grateful for their time spent with us, and greatly admire the vulnerability with which they shared their stories. It was also wonderful to meet and get to know other members of the Hub. Everyone attending the trip was continuously learning throughout the week, which helped minimise the sense of being an imposter that I had within myself. Outside of the designated field trips and sessions throughout the week, we had time to learn about each other’s work and goals, and getting to know the other early career researchers helped mitigate how daunting it can be to make that transition from PhD candidate to professional.”
Blog authors: Sarah Boulter, Tia Brullo, John Burley, Olly Dove, Ailie Gallant, Pallavi Goswami, Ned Haughton, Hanna Heidemann, Claire Mason, Pardeep Pall, Katie Quail, Jenny Styger, Lucy Wesson, Lynn Zhou.