Climate change
Like the rest of the world, the City of Rockingham is moving towards a future influenced by climate change which can potentially affect the activities and infrastructure of the City and the community. These impacts can be broadly grouped as:
Short term impacts - such as an increase in extreme storm events, increase frequency of storms and flooding.
Accumulative short term impacts - such as an increase in storm events may cause increase erosion along our coastline, as well as have implications for the Serpentine River.
Long term impacts - such as a reduction in rainfall and increase in temperature.
All these climate change impacts have potential implications for the core activities of many of the Council's operations. As such, the City needs to be proactive in its response to climate change and institute measures to mitigate the potential impacts.
This will require the development of a Climate Change Response Plan that will list the actions to adapt to and mitigate climate change and provide long term planning to ensure the City continues to function effectively. The City is currently preparing a scope for the Plan and determining the resources necessary to complete the project.
Achievements to date
The City is working with a group of Councils (Cities of Cockburn, Fremantle, Canning and the Towns of Kwinana and East Fremantle) to develop a regional response to climate change. This has resulted in meetings to discuss climate change and coastal vulnerability, as well as exchange information.
The group also worked in partnership with the SRMC’s ClimateWise to apply for Commonwealth grants.
In May 2008, ClimateWise received a grant from the Australian Government Department of Climate Change (DCC) to undertake an assessment of the risks associated with climate change and develop an adaptation action plan. This culminated in the release of the ‘Climate Change Risk Assessment and Adaptation Action Plan’.
Further information is available below.
Useful links
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