It probably won't be Hollywood-blockbuster bad like this scene from the movie 2012, but dramatic change is coming to the Australian landscape. Picture: Sony
CLIMATE change will alter the Australian landscape so dramatically and so quickly that our grandchildren could live in a very different country, according to a landmark CSIRO study.
And the study's lead researchers fear Australians may not be ready to accept the new way their country may soon smell, sound and look.
The Commonwealth's science and research body has produced the first "Australia-wide assessment of the magnitude of the ecological impact that climate change could have on biodiversity" and how the changes could be managed.
It says totally new environments will emerge while others vanish and there will be a decline in forest environments, which will give way to shrubs and grasslands.
"Climate change is likely to start to transform some of Australia's natural landscapes by 2030," said lead researcher Dr Michael Dunlop, from the CSIRO's Ecosystem Sciences division.
"By 2070, the ecological impacts are likely to be very significant and widespread.
"Many of the environments our plants and animals currently exist in will disappear from the continent. Our grandchildren are likely to experience landscapes that are very different to the ones we have known."
The changes will be so profound that they will have major implications for management of the environment and, in particular, Australia's national parks and nature reserves.
"If future generations want to experience and enjoy our distinctive plants and animals and the wonders of the Australian bush, then we need to give biodiversity the greatest opportunity to adapt naturally in a changing and variable environment, rather than trying to prevent ecological change," Dr Dunlop said.
The study identified a range of management options, including ensuring there is plenty of habitat of different types available for plants and animals.
"But one of the biggest challenges could be the community accepting the levels of ecological change that we could experience," Dr Dunlop said.
"Familiar species declining, and species from different areas turning up and establishing; ecosystems people grew up with gradually changing and becoming something new; looking, sounding smelling different.
"I don't know if we are ready to accept this level of change.
"This is also a challenge for conservation science and policy. Current conservation is largely focused on keeping things the same, or restoring their condition. That is quite different from managing ecological change, maintaining the health of an ecosystem as it changes from one type of ecosystem to another."
Wary of past criticism, the CSIRO says it is confident in the accuracy of the complex computer models it used.
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