In the late 1990’s scientists wrested control of NSW estuaries from the engineers, which took a bit of doing! Since then, we have been working hard to ensure that NSW estuaries are managed for ecological as well as anthropocentric values. This has been a multi-facetted journey and included upsetting a paradigm of how estuaries function (which had been uncritically adopted from the northern hemisphere); development and implementation of a rigorous method of assessing and reporting the condition of estuaries; a much better understanding of what an estuary in NSW should be like; and, through research collaborations with academic partners, an increased understanding of the basic processes that shape and maintain ecological function in intermittently open estuaries.
We determined that the response of estuaries to climate change is dependent on their morphology and is an order of magnitude faster than predicted by global ocean and atmospheric models. Managing the interactions of direct human impacts with the consequences of climate change is the challenge for the future.