Climate change threatens iconic sites worldwide, but one country is trying to hide

Venice, Stonehenge and the Statue of Liberty are among more than two dozen World Heritage sites--which are often popular destinations for summer tourists-- threatened by climate change, according to a UNESCO report released Friday.

But no sites in Australia are mentioned in the report, even though the country's Great Barrier Reef, a World Heritage site, has been suffering from a massive coral bleaching event caused by much warmer than average ocean temperatures. Increasing temperatures have been linked to human-caused global warming.

Australia is absent from the report, according to multiple news sites, because the country's ambassador to UNESCO had its section scrubbed over worries the revelation may curb tourism. 

Australia's absence has angered scientists connected to the report as well as local politicians, who say trying to hide the state of the Great Barrier Reef from one report won't stop people from learning about the problem.

"It won't work because Australians realize that the Great Barrier Reef is under terrible threat," Larissa Waters, a Greens senator from Queensland told the ABC.

The report was written before the latest global coral bleaching event, said Adam Markham, the deputy director of climate and energy with the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS). 

Markham said the original draft did mention climate change as a major risk for the reef as well as the site's history. 

The UCS, UNESCO and the United Nations Environmental Program (UNEP) co-authored the report, "World Heritage and Tourism in a Changing Climate," which describes 31 other natural and cultural sites located in 29 countries as being at risk due to climate change. The sites include Yellowstone National Park, Mt. Everest and the Galapagos Islands.

Greenhouse gas emissions from burning fossil fuels such as coal and oil are causing the greatest environmental threat facing these World Heritage sites, the organizations conclude. 

The effects of global warming, such as melting glaciers, rising sea levels and worsening droughts could devastate local economies heavily reliant upon the tourism industry, the report finds. Though beneficial to local economies, the researchers note that "the tourism sector itself is vulnerable to climate change," and carbon emissions from tourism are expected to more than double within the next 25 years. 

The report calls for action to be taken to protect the sites, which have "universal value to humankind." In order to do this, the report concludes, world leaders must work to implement new environmental policies, reduce greenhouse gas emissions to meet the Paris Agreement aimed at preventing global temperatures from rising more than 2 degrees Celsius, or 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit, above preindustrial levels, and educate tourists about climate threats facing vulnerable World Heritage sites. 

“Globally, we need to better understand, monitor and address climate change threats to World Heritage sites,” Mechtild Rössler, director of UNESCO’s World Heritage Center, said in a statement to Mashable. 

“As the report’s findings underscore, achieving the Paris Agreement’s goal of limiting global temperature rise to a level well below 2 degrees Celsius is vitally important to protecting our World Heritage for current and future generations.”

The report notes that historic buildings, monuments and fragile coral reefs are particularly vulnerable to climate change and environmental stressors. Beyond the Great Barrier Reef, more than half of the world's coral reefs are at risk of degradation, while rising Adriatic sea levels have already damaged hundreds of buildings in Venice. 

In some cases, relocating buildings and monuments may be an option, but in most situations it is not. 

"Cultural resources lose part of their significance and meaning when moved," the report notes. "And, once lost, they are gone forever."

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