We recognise Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders as the sovereign Traditional Owners of Australia and thank them for their stewardship of this Country, its lands, waters and skies. We respectfully acknowledge their culture and customary practices, and pay respect to their Ancestors, Elders and future leaders.

For the first time, the State of the Environment report includes a strong Indigenous narrative across all 12 thematic chapters, a narrative crafted through recognising the leadership, collaboration and authorship of Indigenous Australians who continue their connection as Traditional Owners to their lands, waters and skies.

Click to view the State of the Environment report

On 28 March 2025 the government assumed a Caretaker role. Information on websites maintained by the Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water will be published in accordance with the Guidance on Caretaker Conventions until after the conclusion of the caretaker period.

Due to technical issues, graphs, maps and tables are currently not displaying within the main content, however, are available via the chapter resources navigation bar. We are working on a solution to resolve the issue.

Reference

van Ommen TD & Morgan V (2010). Snowfall increase in coastal East Antarctica linked with southwest Western Australian drought. Nature Geoscience 3(4):267–272.

Vance TR, Roberts JL, Plummer CT, Kiem AS & van Ommen TD (2015). Interdecadal Pacific variability and eastern Australian megadroughts over the last millennium. Geophysical Research Letters 42(1):129–137.

Lim EP, Hendon HH, Boschat G, Hudson D, Thompson DWJ, Dowdy AJ & Arblaster JM (2019). Australian hot and dry extremes induced by weakenings of the stratospheric polar vortex. Nature Geoscience 12(11):896–901.

Abram NJ, Henley BJ, Sen Gupta A, Lippmann TJR, Clarke H, Dowdy AJ et al. (2021). Connections of climate change and variability to large and extreme forest fires in southeast Australia. Communications Earth and Environment 2(1):8.

Udy DG, Vance TR, Kiem AS, Holbrook NJ & Curran MAJ (2021). Links between large-scale modes of climate variability and synoptic weather patterns in the southern Indian Ocean. Journal of Climate 34(3):883–899.