There is little quantitative information on how climate change will impact habitats within the Alligator Rivers Region (ARR), Northern Territory, and in turn, Kakadu National Park (KNP) and the Ranger Uranium Mine. Given the potential for significant impacts on Park values, it is important that information is collated that can inform studies on: determining the impacts on habitats in the wider KNP; and assessing the rehabilitation and the long term landform stability of Ranger Mine.

This paper presents an assessment of the spatial information available for the ARR with a focus on Digital Elevation Models (DEMs) and establishing a baseline GIS for information to provide the basis for demonstrating long term environmental change that may be attributed to climate change. Building on the climate change GIS developed, spatial analyses were conducted to show how habitats may be impacted by climate change, thereby identifying locations of potential refugia. First pass assessment using spatial data has indicated the locations and areal extent of habitats in the region likely to be impacted including: freshwater wetlands, mangroves, monsoon forest, riparian communities, beaches and streams (hydrology). Initial results indicate that when the freshwater wetland types ('area subject to inundation' and 'swamps' from the GEODATA 250K dataset) are extracted 72% (180 hectares) of the freshwater wetland habitat within Kakadu may be affected by sea level rise.