Annual resolution reconstructions of alpine temperatures are rare, particularly for the Southern Hemisphere, while no snow cover reconstructions exist. These records are essential to place in context the impact of anthropogenic global warming against historical major natural climate events such as the Roman Warm Period (RWP), Medieval Climate Anomaly (MCA) and Little Ice Age (LIA). Here we show for a marginal alpine region of Australia using a carbon isotope speleothem reconstruction, warming over the past five decades has experienced equivalent magnitude of temperature change and snow cover decline to the RWP and MCA. The current rate of warming is unmatched for the past 2000 years and seasonal snow cover is at a minimum. On scales of several decades, mean maximum temperatures have undergone considerable change ≈ ± 0.8 °C highlighting local scale susceptibility to rapid temperature change, evidence of which is often masked in regional to hemisphere scale temperature reconstructions.

Executive Summary qAs an adjunctto efficient HartfordSite characterizationand remediationof groundwater contamination,an automaticmonitor networkhas been used to measureColumbiaRiver and adjacent groundwaterlevels in several areasof the HartfordSite slice 1991. Waterlevels, temperatures,and electrical conductivity measuredby the automaticmonitor networkprovided an initial databasewith which to calibratemodels and from which to infer groundand river water interactionsfor site characterizationand remediationactivities. Measurementsof the dynamic river/aquifersystem have been simultaneousat l-hr intervals, with a quality suitable for hydrologicmodeling and for computer model calibrationand testing. This reportdescribesthe equipment,procedures, and results from measurementsdone in 1993.During 1993, ColumbiaRiver and groundwaterelevations were measuredhourlyat 50 locations in seven areas of the HanfordSite in southcentralWashington State. Watertemperaturewas measured at I0 of these locations; electrical_nductivity was measuredat five.Waterlevel accuracyis unknown, but is believed to be within +0.I ft. Factorsaffectingaccuracy are topographic surveys, instrumentcalibrations, and steel tape measurements. Measurementprecision appearsto be within 4-0.02 ft for wells and 4-0.2 ft for river stage. Repeat,xlsteel tape measurements vary within +0.01 ft. Survey errorsvary with distance between sites, but most @pearto be less than 4.0.07 ft. Visual inspectionand graphic review of data confirmedits continuity. Comparisonsbetween simultaneoussteel tape and dataloggerreadingswere used as periodic data qualitychecks. River elevations varied up to 15 ft during the year and up to 9 ft duringa single day. The 300 Areariver elevationvaried about60% as much as the other stations becauseof the influenceof the McNary Dam forebay. Ice Harbor Dam tailwateralso influencedthe fluctuationof the river in the 300 Area. Groundwaterelevations varied up to about3 ft per day in a few wells nearest the riverand up to about 6 ft over the season in some wells.Electricalconductivityof water in wells was influencedby river intrusionto a small degree. Riverbank seep conductivity varied between river and well values. Each of these factors is important in more efficient site characterizationand remediafion. ee. 111

Palaeoclimate data relating to hydroclimate variability over the past millennia have a vital contribution to make to the water sector globally. The water industry faces considerable challenges accessing climate data sets that extend beyond that of historical gauging stations. Without this, variability around the extremes of floods and droughts is unknown and stress-testing infrastructure design and water demands is challenging. User-friendly access to relevant palaeoclimate data is now essential, and importantly, an efficient process to determine which proxies are most relevant to a planning scenario, and geographic area of interest. This paper presents PalaeoWISE (Palaeoclimate Data for Water Industry and Security Planning) a fully integrated, and quality-assured database of proxy data extracted from data repositories and publications collated in Linked Paleo Data (LiPD) format. We demonstrate the application of the database in Queensland, one of Australia’s most hydrologically extreme states. The database and resultant hydroclimate correlations provides both the scientific community, and water resource managers, with a valuable resource to better manage for future climate changes.

Wildfires are a significant hazard with ∼40% of the Earth's terrestrial surface being fire prone, and ∼3% of the terrestrial surface burning each year (Chapin et al., 2011;Giglio et al., 2010). In many areas, instances of dangerous fire weather are increasing (Jones et al., 2022). In northern California and Oregon, the likelihood of extreme autumn fire weather has increased by 40% (Hawkins et al., 2022), and both the frequency and size of wildfires have increased in the western United States (Abatzoglou & Williams, 2016;Iglesias et al., 2022). A long-term increase in both extreme fire weather and fire season length has been observed in parts of Australia (BOM and CSIRO, 2020), and there has been a global increase in the frequency of compound fire weather and meteorological drought events (Richardson et al., 2022). Fire regimes are a function of climate, human activity, and land use.