New advice from Baroness Brown, Chair of the Adaptation
Committee, in the form of a letter responding to the Government's
request for advice on stronger climate adaptation objectives.
The key takeaways are:
- The UK should now be prepared for climate change beyond the
long-term temperature goal of the Paris Agreement. Planning for
2°C by 2050 is now a prudent minimum level for the country to
prepare for. See below for the breakdown of what this means.
- The Committee recommends that a framework of clear long-term
objectives should be set out. These longer-term adaptation
objectives need to be driven through a set of interim milestones,
with targets every five years.
- Government departments need to be clearly accountable for the
delivery of the objectives.
This advice comes just weeks before COP30, taking place in
Brazil. Adaptation is a main theme of this year's COP.
There is still time to join a briefing on this starting at 11am
where there will be an opportunity for questions -
click to register
here.
UK weather extremes at 2°C global warming above
preindustrial levels
- A global warming level of 2°C above preindustrial levels will
result in significant changes in the UK's weather and climate.
More impactful, more frequent, and increasingly unprecedented
extremes will be seen. It is resilience to these extremes that
needs to be supported through strong adaptation objectives.
-
Heatwaves: heatwaves will become more frequent
and widespread at 2°C global warming. Averaged across England,
the chance of an officially defined heatwave occurring doubles
from a 40% chance each year in the 1981 to 2010 climate, to
close to an 80% chance each year.
-
Drought: hot dry summers are expected to
become more frequent. Averaged across England, the time spent
under drought conditions due to low rainfall is expected to
double at 2°C global warming compared to the 1981 to 2010
climate.
-
Flooding: at 2°C global warming, peak rainfall
averaged across the UK is expected to increase by up to 10–15%
for the wettest days. Peak river flows will increase by up to
40% for some UK river catchments. Sea level rise will continue
and accelerate with 15–25 cm of additional sea level rise
expected by 2050 for UK coastal cities.
-
Fire weather: future projections show a
doubling of days (compared to the 1981 to 2010 average) with
conditions highly favourable for wildfires over at least 5% of
England and Wales at 2°C global warming. They also show a close
to trebling of days in the peak wildfire month of July from
three days per year on average in a 1981 to 2010 climate to
approximately eight days per year for the UK as whole. Wildfire
season will become longer, extending into autumn.
-
Storms: future changes in UK storms due to
global warming remain uncertain at 2°C global warming. However,
there is evidence for increased combined impacts from wet and
windy conditions generated by UK storms under global climate
change. For example, estimates for approximately 4°C global
warming suggests potential for a two to four times increase in
the likelihood of extreme events with both high wind and river
flow in the future.
