2nd February 2012 Toronto, Canada
UK releases Climate Change Risk Assessment
Last week, the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affiars (DEFRA) released a comprehensive report into the risks and opportunities presented to the UK by climate change. The report, the first of its kind and the first in a five-year cycle, assesses 700 impacts (100 in exhaustive detail) across 11 sectors and is available to download on the DEFRA website.
Prominent among the many risks and opportunities the CCRA identifies (in the event that the UK took no further action on climate change) are:
- Hotter summers, causing 580 to 5,900 additional premature deaths per year by the 2050s
- Warmer winters, reducing cold-related deaths by 3,900 to 24,000 per year by the 2050s
- Major water shortages by the 2050s
- Significant risk of flooding, causing £2.1 B to £12 B of damage per year by the 2080s
- Opening of Arctic shipping routes due to melting ice
- Reduction in timber yields of 10 % to 25 % by the 2080s, due to drought and pests
- A longer growing season, increasing yields of some crops by 20 % to 140 % by the 2050s if water is available
This report will be used to shape the National Adaptation Programme, the government’s plan to maintain the UK’s resilience to climate change. The NAP will be released in 2013, and everybody is invited to participate in the public dialogue that will shape it. The Science and Innovation Network in Canada has already been working with UK-CIP to establish a cross-Atlantic dialogue on how Canadian cities can effectively adapt to climate change.
Reading this post six months after it was written, it’s scary to see how quickly some predictions are starting to come true. Hotter summers: the heat wave in the USA, where literally thousands of temperature records were broken in a couple of weeks. Water shortage: we all heard about the controversial hosepipe ban which was only lifted a short time ago. Opening of Arctic shipping routes: I recently read that the Arctic hasn’t been as ice-free as now since the 1860s. And so on.
Since it’s clear that the parties in government will slash subsidies from now on, the UK should now place its hopes on community-owned photovoltaic farms like the one recently opened in Oxfordshire. It’s reassuring to see cooperations continue the fight against global warming.