Emerging threatsAssessing climate change risks to U.K.

Climate change is happening now. Globally, 14 of the 15 hottest years on record have occurred since 2000.

The impacts of climate change are already being felt in the United Kingdom, and urgent action is required to address climate-related risks, the Committee on Climate Change’s (CCC)’s Adaptation Sub-Committee (ASC) said the other day.

The ASC’s new independent report to Government, U.K. Climate Change Risk Assessment Evidence Report, sets out the most urgent risks and opportunities arising for the United Kingdom from climate change.

The CCC notes that the report is the result of more than three years of work involving hundreds of leading scientists and experts from the public and private sectors and civil society. The risk assessment has been peer reviewed by U.K. and international specialists.

Changes to the U.K. climate are likely to include periods of too much or too little water, increasing average and extreme temperatures, and sea level rise. The report concludes that the most urgent risks for the United Kingdom resulting from these changes are:

• Flooding and coastal changerisks to communities, businesses and infrastructure.
• Risks to health, wellbeing and productivity from high temperatures
• Risk of shortages in the public water supply, and water for agriculture, energy generation and industry, with impacts on freshwater ecology.
• Risks to natural capital, including terrestrial, coastal, marine and freshwater ecosystems, soils and biodiversity.
• Risks to domestic and international food production and trade.
• Risks of new and emerging pests and diseases, and invasive non-native species, affecting people, plants and animals.

The opportunities for the United Kingdom from climate change include:

• U.K. agriculture and forestry may be able to increase productionwith warmer weather and longer growing seasons, if constraints such as water availability and soil fertility are managed.
• There may be economic opportunities for U.K. businessesfrom an increase in global demand for adaptation-related goods and services, such as engineering and insurance.

The impact of the recent vote to leave the European Union does not change the overall conclusions of the risk assessment. However, some individual risks may change if EU-derived policies and legislation are withdrawn and not replaced by equivalent or better U.K. measures. The Adaptation Sub-Committee will assess the implications of the EU referendum in its next statutory report to Parliament on the U.K. National Adaptation Program, due to be published in June 2017.

Lord Krebs, Chairman of the Adaptation Sub-Committee of the Committee on Climate Change,said: “The impacts of climate change are becoming ever clearer, both in the United Kingdom and around the world. We must take action now to prepare for the further, inevitable changes we can expect. Our independent assessment today, supported by the work of hundreds of scientists and other experts, identifies the most urgent climate change risks and opportunities which need to be addressed. Delaying or failing to take appropriate steps will increase the costs and risks for all UK nations arising from the changing climate.”

Background

• The Climate Change Act requires the U.K. government to compile every five years its assessment of the risks and opportunities arising for the United Kingdom from climate change, known as the Climate Change Risk Assessment (CCRA). The ASC’s Evidence Report published earlier this week will inform the government’s second Climate Change Risk Assessment due to be presented to Parliament in January 2017. The first CCRA was presented to Parliament by Government in 2012.
• The Climate Change Act places a duty on the Adaptation Sub-Committee to provide independent advice six months in advance of the government’s Climate Change Risk Assessment report to Parliament being due. The Evidence Report, consisting of eight individual chapters looking at key areas of risk and opportunity, constitutes the ASC’s advice on the government’s second CCRA. Each chapter has been written by expert lead authors supported by co-authors with particular specialties. The individual chapters are the product of their expert authors. A Synthesis Report has also been produced by the ASC to highlight the key messages of the Evidence Report.
• The Synthesis ReportU.K. Climate Change Risk Assessment Evidence Report, together with the chapters of the full Evidence Report, and associated materials is available here.