"Scientists are warning this summer's sharp swings from record heat to torrential rain illustrate how climate change is becoming a dominant driving force in our weather.

Over the past few months, multiple parts of the country have lurched from extreme heat to flooding — sometimes in a matter of weeks — in a summer that has been described as one of "breakneck climate whiplash" by the Climate Council.

Making it more unusual, according to meteorologist and climate councillor Andrew Watkins, is that many of the extreme heat records have occurred despite the presence of a weak La Niña — which typically brings cooler, wetter conditions to large parts of Australia.

He said it points to a new reality where once reliable drivers of weather are now being overpowered by human influence.

    "Climate change clearly is overtaking some of the other drivers at times," Dr Watkins, an adjunct professor at Monash University said.

"We are seeing records occur when we wouldn't really expect to see them."
Climate whiplash affected every state

In a new report by the Climate Council, which catalogues the summer's extreme events and their toll, examples of weather flipping from one extreme to another can be seen in nearly every state and territory.

One of the most stark examples of climate whiplash over recent months was in south-eastern Australia, where communities went from extreme heat and catastrophic fire warnings to flash flooding and back again in the space of just one month.

This timeline shows how that played out for Victoria's Otway Ranges in the state's south-west.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-03-17/summer-weather-whiplash-points-to-driving...

And this "Climate whiplash" has resulted in new grain records in WA, and in the north and NSW. Lower in Victoria. Weather varies, who knew?

The phenomenon is driven by a warmer atmosphere that holds more moisture, intensifying both droughts and downpours.  As climate scientist Linden Ashcroft notes, “We’ve got more energy in our earth system than at any other time in human history,” making weather more erratic and destructive. While some farmers benefit temporarily, the long-term risks—unpredictable growing seasons, soil degradation, and infrastructure strain—are growing.  The claim that good harvests disprove climate whiplash overlooks the fact that such extremes are now part of a new, unstable normal.

The Clausius–Clapeyron equation sets a baseline for moisture capacity, but real-world conditions determine whether that capacity is fully realised.

The Clausius–Clapeyron equation is expressed as:

where $P_1$ and $P_2$ are vapor pressures at temperatures $T_1$ and $T_2$ (in Kelvin), $\Delta H_{\text{vap}}$ is the enthalpy of vaporization, and $R$ is the universal gas constant.

This equation, derived in the 1850s by Rudolf Clausius and based on earlier work by Benoît Paul Émile Clapeyron, provides a thermodynamic baseline for how saturation vapor pressure increases with temperature—approximately 7% per 1°C warming in Earth’s lower atmosphere.

While the equation sets the theoretical maximum moisture capacity, real-world conditions like atmospheric circulation, vertical motion, and storm dynamics determine whether this potential is realized.  Observational studies confirm that atmospheric moisture increases align closely with the Clausius–Clapeyron scaling.

A key study supporting this is the IPCC Sixth Assessment Report (2021), which states there is high confidence that global atmospheric water vapor has increased since the 1970s in line with the Clausius–Clapeyron expectation.  This is further supported by NOAA’s 2024 “State of the Climate” report and independent analyses from the University of Colorado Boulder, which show observed specific humidity trends closely matching the theoretical 7% per degree Celsius scaling.

Thus, while the equation was fully formulated in the 19th century, its real-world validation and widespread acceptance in climate science solidified in the 21st century, particularly through observational data confirming its predictive power for extreme precipitation and atmospheric moisture trends.

Ai_Took_Our_Jobs wrote on Mar 22^nd, 2026 at 6:26pm:



You do know the IPCC doesn't "do" studies. It merely reports. So you have to do much better than that.

NCEI 2024 shows 7%, but it is a "re-analysis". It means they couldn't find  it in the past. But a model did.



Ai_Took_Our_Jobs wrote on Mar 22^nd, 2026 at 6:26pm:


Yes. re-analysis from models. Now back to the null hypothesis - What was the question asked for it and how did it find two completely different outputs.

Sydney rainfall since 1900 -




I don't see a 7% increase. It was wetter in about 1962. I would call that a fail. Perhaps you have other data?

Aunty ABC is trusted by the people.

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Yes. And Melbourne is the most exciting city in the world too