About this Site

The climate change projections for Australia released in 2015 were primarily developed to support the planning needs of Australia’s natural resource management sector, and to provide information to assist climate adaptation processes. However, the information presented on this website has applicability across all sectors. Since 2015, additional and/or updated information have been incorporated as appropriate. Information presented on this website covers the whole of Australia so may be useful for some applications outside of the natural resource management community. In December 2020, the website's design and navigation were refreshed, content updated and new content added.

Information available on this site exists in two distinct categories:

Summary climate projection statements

These are based on the current generation climate model data, but also synthesise additional information (such as model evaluation and downscaling) and include confidence assessment. These, mainly qualitative, statements provide key contextual information for the quantitative information also available on the website, as well as providing key messages for a range of purposes.

They are drawn from the conclusions of the Cluster and Technical Reports, where supporting analysis may also be found. On the website, these statements are best viewed by using the Regional Climate Explorer which allows users to navigate through key messages across the clusters and sub-clusters.

Climate model data

Climate model data from the full set of current generation global climate models has been assessed for Australia (and for the four available greenhouse gas emissions scenarios) and can be explored through a number of the website dashboards. Registered website users are able to download climate change projection data from the site. There are typically two types of data available data for download. These are: 

Projected change data – Projected climate changes relative to the IPCC 1986-2005 baseline. Annual, seasonal and monthly data is available at 20-year time slices centred on 2030, 2050, 2070 and 2090. These data are presented as projected ranges of change based on the 10-90th percentile of the model range (as bar plots and tables), and for individual models (via the Map Explorer)

Application ready data – Projected climate changes applied to a 30 year observational data set (1981-2010). This data will be supplied for eight individual climate models that are representative of the range of results for Australia from the full suite of global climate models.

These two categories of information are provided at different levels of spatial detail to suit different purposes: NRM super-clusters, NRM clusters, NRM sub-clusters (both statements and data), grid points and selected cities and towns (data only).

Note that the climate model data do not factor in additional lines evidence considered in the climate projection statements, and users of climate model data are advised to also consult contextual statements and confidence ratings for key contextual information.