Climate change is a feature of the 21st century. Making sensible choices on how we can adapt to climate change hinges on understanding what changes are likely, where they are likely, and when they will start to have a significant impact.

Creating these adaptation strategies is a forward-looking exercise. Climate Futures for Tasmania will use sophisticated climate modelling techniques and our current knowledge to describe the most likely future climate scenarios. These projections are computer-simulated and will produce data to use in decision-making processes.

A key challenge is to interpret climate projections at a local scale, so that communities, industries and individuals can use information in their local planning and adaptation actions.

The Climate Futures for Tasmania project builds on earlier work with Hydro Tasmania, and new climate projections will be made at a finer scale than ever before.

The data generated will better represent Tasmania's geography and its effect on the local climate. Data will be available to local government, emergency services, water authorities, power companies, farmers, graziers, fruit growers, vignerons and researchers. The project will also provide an accessible basis for subsequent climate change research, by archiving fine-scale climate model outputs for the entire state of Tasmania.

Bringing this information to a broad cross-section of the community in one project is unusual. We expect it will promote a more cooperative approach to adapting to climate change than would be possible with individuals working separately.
The project is possible with support through funding and research of a consortium of state and national partners.

• Research partners
• Funding partners