Will Climate Change Destroy Adventure in Australia? A Dystopian Look at the Year 2100

It’s been a while since we’ve had a normal summer holiday, hey? Whether dampened by endless rain or scorched by flames, coordinating your retreat into nature is getting tricky. Well, soon it might not just be the day-to-day weather that’s raining on your parade, but the growing climate change impacts too. Here’s what could be in store for Australia in 2100.

Skiing in The High Country

Remember back in the day when people would laugh when you said you went skiing in Australia? And then you’d show them the epic slopes of High Country Victoria or Kosciuszko National Park just to see the stunned but impressed look in their eyes? 

Well, no one’s laughing now. And all those moments of shock are for the entirely wrong reasons. Almost all of the ski resorts in Australia have closed.

First, they shrunk their opening times – what used to be an average 112-day ski season shrunk to 30 days by 2050. Then, they closed completely. 

The only resort open now is Thredbo in NSW, which at 2,037m was always Australia’s highest. You know the chances of snow are pretty much slim-to-none, but you decide to head there and hope for the best. Maybe you’ll be lucky.

Arriving at Thredbo, it soon becomes clear why. There’s no snow here — and there hasn’t been for years, according to the worn-out, ex-ski bum manning the desk at your hotel.

If you want to attempt to ski, he says, there’s a teeny, tiny chance of man-made snow at the top of the one remaining slope. But even snow cannons need it to be below freezing to make snow, and the chances of that halved way back in the 2040s. Mountain biking it is then.

A Coastal Walk in Sydney

It was 2020 when the prediction was made. 40% of Australia’s beaches would be lost to rising sea levels. Of course, no one listened. And I guess they were right not to because we didn’t lose 40% — we lost 60%. 

That’s over 20,000km of iconic Australian coastline, gone. There’s no such thing as a coastal walk in Sydney now — the city was one of the hardest-hit areas. Its once famous beaches were washed away and replaced with wild oceans that smash against deserted storefronts and long-abandoned homes.

The closest you get to a coastal walk is a virtual reality walkthrough of the famous Bondi to Coogee Coastal Walk. The real thing has been underwater for decades now. And those multi-million-dollar Bondi Beach houses everyone was fighting over? Well, let’s just say they wished they’d bought inland. Who was it that said climate change impacts weren’t real, again? 

Is this really what’s in store for us?

The Paris Climate Agreement states ‘to avoid dangerous climate change we need to limit global warming to well below 2°C and pursue efforts to limit it to 1.5°C’. If we don’t, the impacts could be devastating. And a world that looks very, very different when it comes to adventure.

But it’s not just about the risk of long-forgotten flip flops and deserted beach towels. Scientists at Climate Central estimate that 275 million people worldwide live in areas that will be flooded if we reach 3 degrees of warming. That’s ten times the entire Australian population. 

Here’s a sneak peek into the future, if we don’t take some seriously drastic action soon:

• Australia and New Zealand’s sea levels will rise at rates higher than the global average
• There’ll be a 50% increase in bushfires – the Black Summer Bushfires were just the beginning
• Floods follow fires, so those heavy rainfalls brought by La Niña will become the norm
• We can expect more droughts (just what the farmers need, huh?), especially in Eastern Australia
• Oh and cyclones, yep. There’ll be more of them too

Yet despite these dire predictions, we’re currently on track to rise 1.5 degrees by 2030. Yep, you read that right — in less than a decade’s time. 

Will our rainforests all dry up? | Photo by Caspar S | Illustration @velevitart

We’ve Still Got Time – Just

The good news is that there’s still time to change the future. Making minor lifestyle changes like ditching single-use plastics, buying second-hand, and cycling not driving is an excellent start in the fight against negative climate change impacts. But we need to think bigger.

And one of the biggest impacts you can have is participating in democracy. 

There’s an election coming up and whether you like to read the news or prefer to hide out in the bush, the impact of the result will affect both you and the bush you like to spend so much time in. Learn how to make the most impact possible with your vote, and how to have impactful discussions about voting for the planet to help amplify your impact.

If politics really isn’t your thing, that’s ok. There are heaps of ways to help save our planet. Check out how to change to an ethical bank, save the world on your daily run, and factor in sustainability in your daily decision making. 

If we all do a little bit of good, a little bit more often, the future of the outdoors won’t look so bleak. 

Feature photo by Caspar S | Illustration @velevitart