22/10/2026
π Water is life β and in Southwest WA, it's also one of the clearest places climate change shows up first.
Rainfall across this region has been declining since the late 1960s, and groundwater recharge has been falling with it - research using ancient cave records has shown replenishment now sitting at an 800-year low. It's not a distant risk. It's the water security story for Perth and the southwest, happening now.
National Water Week is a good moment to sit with that. Not every challenge has an easy fix, but understanding just how much strain the system is under locally is where any real response has to start.
Source: UNSW cave-record groundwater study; McFarlane, "Climate change impacts on the hydrology of south-western Australia," EGU 2021