Flooding rated as worst climate change threat facing UK

Defra report lists 700 impacts, including flood risk for 3.6 million people, water shortages, soil erosion and wildlife disruption

• Climate change: threats and opportunities to the UK - graphic

Juliette Jowit,

The Guardian,   Thursday 26 January 2012

Flooding is the greatest threat to the UK posed by climate change, with up to 3.6 million people at risk by the middle of the century, according to a report published on Thursday by the environment department.

The first comprehensive climate change risk assessment for the UK identifies hundreds of ways rising global temperatures will have an impact if no action is taken. They include the financial damage caused by flooding, which would increase to £2bn-£10bn a year by 2080, more deaths in heatwaves, and large-scale water shortages by mid-century.

Unusually for such documents, it also highlighted ways in which the country could benefit from milder winters and drier summers, such as fewer cold-related deaths, better wheat crops and a more attractive climate for tourists.

"If you had to pick one particular issue I think the flooding issue is the most dominant," said Sir Bob Watson, chief scientist at the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.

Lord John Krebs, chairman of the adaptation committee of the independent advisory group Committee on Climate Change, said that without planning and investment to deal with the threats the UK would "sleepwalk into disaster". The benefits of climate change should also not be taken as reason to stop worrying about it, even with policies to reduce the threats, said Krebs: "Whether it will result in a net benefit we simply can't tell."

Scientists and other experts, led by Defra, identified 700 impacts of climate change in the UK, including the possibility of refugees arriving from wars over dwindling water and food.

High-impact events expected by mid-century included decreased forestation caused by red band needle blight, shortages in public water supply (especially in the north, Midlands and south of England), and worse water quality.

The assessors selected the 100 most pressing threats and opportunities and rated these according to their impact, the confidence of the modellers, and how soon the threats might occur. All the report's forecasts assume no governmental action to reduce or remove the threats.

The four most immediate "high consequence" risks all concerned flooding, with the expectation that in 10 years or so there will be increased flood damage to homes, with knock-on effects on insurance premiums and mental health.

Between 1.7 million and 3.6 million people are expected to be at risk of flooding by 2050, without investment to lessen the threat.

Surface water flooding would be likely to get worse, Watson added.

Other issues highlighted by the report include changes in wildlife migration, alterations in species communities as plants and animals fail to move fast enough to thrive, sewer overflows polluting the coast, changes in the soil, erosion from heavier rains, loss of staff working-time from heat stress, changes in fish stocks, and wildfires in drier summers.

The findings follow controversy over cuts to the UK flood defence budget.

However, Caroline Spelman, the environment secretary, said the report justified the department's decision to ask for more capital and fewer revenue funds from the Treasury, and said government money would be supplemented by contributions from local communities.

"[Comparing] the last four years of the Labour government and the first four years of this government there will be a reduction of 6% … but you can get more homes protected for the same amount of money," said Spelman.

The report was widely welcomed as a way to help government departments, businesses and councils plan ahead.

But Mary Creagh, the shadow environment secretary, said: "In 2010 Labour invested £354m in protecting homes from flooding, which has been cut by 27% to £259m a year for the next four years under this government.

"Ministers are playing Russian roulette with people's homes and businesses by cutting too far, too fast, and could leave communities blighted, with homeowners unable to insure, mortgage or sell their homes after 2013, when Labour's deal with the insurance industry runs out."

It will be seized upon by lobbyists to argue for spending priorities, and used by government to prepare the national adaptation plan, due to be published next year.

Julian Hunt, emeritus professor of climate modelling, at University College London, said the report's finding that there would be longer periods of "static weather" and cloud cover, could threaten energy from solar and wind sources .

"This leads to dangerous urban heat island temperatures and droughts. But it also indicates the danger of lengthy, very low, wind conditions, or cloudy conditions – so low-carbon energy alternatives to wind and solar are essential," said Hunt.

Peter Mallaburn, reader in climate policy at De Montfort University, said the need to save energy was in conflict with government policies not pushing for higher energy efficiency standards for commercial buildings.

"This report says, for the first time, that not only are our homes and offices leaky, but that they will start to overheat in a warmer world," said Mallaburn. "We need a coherent strategy to sort out this mess. Let's hope that this report acts as a wake-up call."

A website has been set up asking for the public's views on the national adaptation programme.

Climate warming would cause loss of life

 The Age, January 17, 2012 

A global temperature rise of two degrees by 2050 would result in increased loss of life, a new Australian study has found.

Scientists from the Queensland University of Technology and the CSIRO say they have conducted world-first research which looks at the "years of life lost" due to climate change.

They focused on the city of Brisbane, which has a subtropical climate.

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"A two-degree increase in temperature in Brisbane between now and 2050 would result in an extra 381 years of life lost per year in Brisbane," lead 

researcher Associate Professor Adrian Barnett, from the university's Institute of Health and Biomedical Innovation, said in a statement.

"A two-degree increase in temperature is the figure in the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change says is dangerous, but could be reached unless more aggressive measures are undertaken to reduce greenhouse gas emissions."

Professor Barnett said an increase of more than two degrees would be catastrophic.

"A four-degree increase in temperature would result in an extra 3242 years of life lost per year in Brisbane."

Professor Barnett said the "years of life lost" measurement gives greater weight to deaths at younger ages instead of focusing just on elderly people.

"We wanted to use years of life lost because we suspected that many temperature-related deaths were in the elderly, which would reduce the public health importance of temperature compared with other issues," he said.

"In fact, we found the opposite, with a surprisingly high years of life lost figure."

Interestingly, the study found that a one-degree increase would result in a decrease in the number of lives lost.

This is believed to be because the increase in heat-related years of life lost are offset by the decrease in cold-related years of life lost. The researchers said cold-related deaths are significant, even in a city with Brisbane's warm climate.

And many deaths could be avoided if people have better insulation in their houses.

"Many houses in Brisbane are built of thin planks of wood and are poorly insulated, which means the occupants are exposed to whatever the temperature is outside," Professor Barnett said.

The researchers believe that while their work was focused on Brisbane, it contains helpful information to decision-makers in other areas as well.

The study has been published in the journal Nature Climate Change.

Fourteen steps to reduce global warming

Nicky Phillips, SCIENCE 

The Age, January 13, 2012

REDUCING the amount of soot and methane released into the atmosphere could slow the world's warming by half a degree, save millions of lives, and dramatically improve global air quality, a study has found.

A group of international scientists claim 14 practical methods could reduce the pollutants, which not only contribute to global warming but also kill or debilitate millions of people each year, and increase global crop yields at the same time.

While much focus has been placed on reducing carbon dioxide emissions, methane – a powerful greenhouse gas – and black soot play a role in man-made global warming and are a significant source of air pollution.

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By screening more than 400 tried-and-tested soot and methane pollution reduction processes being used on a small scale around the world, the team, led by NASA scientist Drew Shindell, came up with a list of approaches to improve air quality and reduce global warming that could be implemented on a regional and global scale.

Changes to coal mining and natural gas extraction combined with better landfill and livestock management would reduce global methane, while improvements to diesel engines, replacing wood and dung fires with modern stoves and banning agricultural burning would lower soot emissions.

To measure the impact these pollution reduction methods could have on global warming, the team added the controls to computer models using two future emissions scenarios – one based on business as usual, where carbon emissions were not constrained, and one based on a low-carbon world.

The results show global temperature could be decreased by half a degree by 2050.

And, in a low-carbon world, the soot and methane reductions would keep the world's thermostat below the danger level of 2 degrees warming.

Lower methane levels would avoid annual crop losses of between 30 million and 137 million tonnes in 2030, while soot reductions would prevent between 700,000 and 4.7 million premature deaths a year.

The cost benefits to reducing the pollutants were also significant, said the scientists, who published their findings in the journal Science.

"Methane emission reductions are valued at $700 to $5000 per metric tonne, which is well above the typical marginal abatement costs, [of about] $250," they said.

An atmospheric chemist at the CSIRO said that, scientifically, the research was "a very strong piece of work".

Melita Keywood, a principal research scientist at CSIRO Marine and Atmospheric Research, said: "The measures are the sort of things that can be done now, and can have a short-term consequence which will really appeal to policymakers."

SIGNS OF THINGS TO COME: SALINGER ON AUSTRALIAN HEATWAVES

Hot Topic by GUEST on JANUARY 10, 2012

Climate change is happening now and Australia is in the firing line says Jim Salinger in this guest post. This article first appeared in the Dominion Post.

As I watch from my summer subtropical perch in Brisbane, Queensland, the somewhat unprecedented rains that deluged parts of Australia during the summer of 2010/11 have been replaced by sizzling heat waves this summer. These raise some pertinent lessons on climate and risk management for New Zealand. Firstly let's look at some figures and ask the question of what are the climate mechanisms behind the heat waves.

For December 2011 the Bureau of Meteorology figures show that the highest temperatures of the year occurred in the third Australian heat wave of the year. This affected the Pilbara region in the north west of Western Australia. Multiple sites broke the previous Western Australian December record of 48.8ºC on December 26, 1986 with Roebourne recording 49.4ºC on December 21, Onslow Airport recording 49.2ºC on the 22nd and Learmonth 48.9ºC on the 23rd. Roebourne's 49.4ºC was the highest temperature recorded in Australia since 1998.

This month incessant heat has struck the interior with daytime highs soaring to the mid forties. As I pen this there are a few more days of this heat wave left with temperatures averaging between 35ºC and 40ºC in central Australia. Places have been recording daily lows of 30ºC and daily highs of close to 45ºC. Mean temperatures have been running over 6ºC above average.

Meteorologists measure the warmth of the air lying above one spot as the 500 – 1000 hPa thickness. The "thickness" is a measure of how warm or cold a layer of the atmosphere is. High values mean warm air, and low values mean cold air. Summer 500 – 1000 hPa thickness values lie between 5600 and 5700 metres over Australia. It was values of around 5760 metres that brought New Zealand's highest temperatures in the low forties in February 1973.

And what has been happening in late December and early January? An incredibly hot blob of air has sat over parts of inland Australia with thickness values of 5850 metres or more.

It is a simple law of physics that with more greenhouse gases in a layer of atmosphere the warmer surface temperatures get. Atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide now are at 392 parts per million compared with 280ppm in 1750. This means that the lower atmosphere is thicker and retains more warmth, as more carbon dioxide in the atmosphere traps extra heat. The consequence is that global warming leads to an increase in the magnitude and incidence of heat waves.

The first lesson from the sizzling continental heat wave is that global warming has arrived for some time now, and the climate has warmed. Global warming is no longer a theory based on abstract calculations of what the climate is very likely to do in future decades. In 2007 the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) concluded: "It is very likely that hot extremes, heat waves and heavy precipitation events will continue to become more frequent."

The second lesson – the canary in the coal mine – is that because of global warming the frequency of these extreme weather events is only going to increase. Thus the century old high temperature extremes are going to be exceeded more often in the future.

The third lesson is that there needs to be better preparation for these events by civil society. Heat waves can have debilitating effects on the elderly who are not so healthy. The 2003 European heat wave caused at least 40,000 deaths and the 2010 western Russian heat wave 55,000 deaths. Heat waves also increase the fire risk when there is little rain, as occurred in the Black Saturday heat wave and bushfires on 7 February 2009 in Victoria.

At least New Zealand is the lucky country in this respect surrounded by oceans which dampen down any high temperatures. However NIWA future climate scenarios show a large increase in days above 30 and 35ºC in eastern districts with more frequent very hot nor'westers as the 21st century progresses.

Global warming is here, now and not a phenomenon for future generations to deal with. We must embark on a course of emissions reductions targets as soon as possible, to claw back rapidly rising greenhouse gas levels in the atmosphere. If we do not act now the severity of such heat waves and the subsequent damage to life and property will increase. There is no time like the present to invest in our future wellbeing.

Jim Salinger is spending the southern summer at the National Climate Change Adaptation Research Facility at Griffiths University, Queensland as a visiting research fellow.

Cherry-picking contrarian geologists tend to obscure scientific truth

• MIKE SANDIFORD 
• From:
• • 
    
  The Australian, December 31, 2011 12:00AM

GINA Rinehart notoriously claims she has never met a geologist who believes "adding more CO2 to the atmosphere will have any significant effect on climate".

To listen to prominent "contrarian" geologists such as Ian Plimer, you might imagine she never could.

But, despite the bluster, our contrarian geologists are out of kilter with their own community and seem deeply confused about the way the greenhouse effect - by adding more CO2 to the atmosphere, for example - has shaped both the past and the present.

All geology students learn of the importance of the greenhouse effect. It's simply impossible to understand the geological record without it.

In his 2001 award-winning book A Short History of Planet Earth, Plimer has numerous references to the greenhouse effect.

He explains what all young geologists learn as the faint young sun paradox:

"The early sun had a luminosity of some 30 per cent less than now and, over time, luminosity has increased in a steady state.

"The low luminosity of the early sun was such that the Earth's average surface temperature would have been below 0C from 4500 to 2000 million years ago. But there is evidence of running water and oceans as far back as 3800 million years ago." The question is, what kept the early Earth from freezing over?"

Plimer goes on to explain: "This paradox is solved if the Earth had an enhanced greenhouse with an atmosphere of a lot of carbon dioxide and methane."

Here's another quote from Plimer, referring to a time 100 million years ago when the dinosaurs roamed the planet: "The peak of 6 per cent carbon dioxide was at the time of a protracted greenhouse and maximum sea level. At this time, mean annual surface temperatures were 10C to 15C warmer than now."

The problem is, although his temperature estimate is about right, his CO2 estimate is about 50 times too high. CO2 levels were more like 0.12 per cent. At just three times present levels, this is a target we are on track to reach early next century.

Jump forward to 2009 and in his book Heaven and Earth Plimer seems to have quietly forgotten those geological lessons in stating: "Over geological time there is no observed relationship between global climate and atmospheric CO2."

Exactly which Plimer are we to believe?

Scientists are notoriously sceptical of the data collected by others. But ignoring a respected source is reprehensible. Cherry-picking only the data that fits is borderline. Deliberately misrepresenting data or making it up is just not on.

Here's an example. In a section from his new book, How To Get Expelled from School, as reprinted in The Weekend Australian recently, Plimer claims: "Antarctic ice core (Siple) shows that there were 330 parts per million of carbon dioxide in the air in 1900; Mauna Loa Hawaiian measurements in 1960 show that the air then had 260ppm carbon dioxide."

Plimer goes on to say: "Either the ice core data is wrong, the Hawaiian carbon dioxide measurements are wrong, or the atmospheric carbon dioxide content was decreasing during a period of industrialisation."

The implication is there must be something terribly wrong with the orthodox climate science and we are all being taken for a ride.

The problem is that the primary data sources explicitly state the Hawaiian Mauna Loa CO2 measurements for 1960 were in the range 313-320ppm, and that Siple air of age about 1900 has a CO2 content of 295ppm, with the 330ppm concentrations having an estimated air age of 1962-83, entirely in keeping with Mauna Loa.

Who has been taken for a ride?

Sadly, this is not an isolated case. Plimer has persistently claimed that volcanoes contribute much more CO2 to the Earth's atmosphere than do our own activities, blithely ignoring US Geological Survey reference data showing just the opposite - volcanoes emit CO2 at about 1 per cent of the rate of anthropogenic emissions.

Another common meme promoted by our contrarian geologists is that it is now a fact that the climate is cooling.

But may we ask by whose data is this a fact?

Certainly not NASA's, which showed last year was the hottest on record, followed by 2005, 2007, 2009 and 1998. In fact, NASA ranks nine of the hottest 10 years ever recorded between 2001 and last year. You'd reckon NASA had learned a few lessons about being careful with data.

Variations on decadal timescales are more relevant to climate trends than annual variations. NASA shows the average temperature over the decade 2000-09 was a full 0.2C higher than in the 1990s - the biggest decadal rise in temperature ever recorded.

With an increase of more than 0.5C over the past 40 years, the decadal trend is now warming faster than ever. It beggars belief that any serious scientist could assert the climate is cooling.

Our contrarian geologists also avoid the devil in the detail. NASA's data shows that winters are warming faster than the summers and the Arctic faster than the tropics. While the lower atmosphere is warming, the upper atmosphere is cooling.

These characteristics provide diagnostic fingerprints of the heat trapping expected for a greenhouse effect. They provide the smoking gun that points to rising greenhouse gas levels as the cause,  and rule out warming because of additional heat input from the sun.

Could that be why you won't hear our contrarian geologists refer to such data? Could their real agenda be in manufacturing doubt rather than the search for scientific truth?

If so, it wouldn't be a first, as Naomi Oreskes points out in her recent book Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Global Warming.

Now here's a point for those who, like Rinehart, think all geologists toe Plimer's contrarian line.

Oreskes is a noted geologist. Having published groundbreaking research on the origin of the giant South Australian Olympic Dam deposit, she has arguably contributed more to the understanding of Australian mineral wealth than has Plimer.

Now just imagine a meeting between Rinehart and Oreskes - that would be interesting!

Mike Sandiford is professor of geology at the University of Melbourne

Mixed report card for environment

Tom Arup 

The Age, December 13, 2011

The State of the Environment Report can be downloaded here. It is a very large file (118MB). There is also a summary (1.1MB).

CURRENT government spending has been unable to arrest Australia's alarming decline in native animal and plant populations, one of the biggest probes into our environmental health has found.

The 900-page State of the Environment report, released yesterday, has also concluded that global warming, population growth and economic development have become the main drivers of environmental impacts across the country.

In a mixed scorecard, the report, produced every five years, says available evidence suggests the population, range, and genetic diversity of a wide range of Australia's wildlife species is in decline.

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Despite ''promising'' government investment in measures to reduce the main pressures on biodiversity, such as revegetation and curtailing invasive species, they have not been substantially reduced and species decline isn't being reversed.

''While all jurisdictions have appropriate goals in high-level plans, these are often not matched with implementation plans or levels of resourcing capable of achieving the goals,'' the report says.

Since it was compiled, the government has committed an extra $950 million of carbon price revenue towards biodiversity.

The report also identifies unexpected declines in bird and mammal numbers in northern Australia - where land clearing and development pressures are less than the south - suggesting the trends might be worse than previously expected.

The head of the scientific panel behind the work, Dr Tom Hatton from CSIRO, told The Age there are still many parts of Australia in a good environmental state. But he identified coastal and semi-urban areas as increasingly facing the impact of rapid urban development and climate change. Dr Hatton said some positive signs were emerging that the link between economic and population growth and environmental damage could be reduced with innovation and improved efficiencies.

''Our per-capita water use is going down in the capital cities,'' Dr Hatton said, ''and there is some early evidence our landfill waste generation is slowing. So I'm hopeful we can decouple economic growth from the environment. Confident? Well that's another question.''

Environment Minister Tony Burke said yesterday: ''There's acknowledgment in the report that given the amount of degradation that's happened in some places, we're never going back to the original environment that was here 200 years ago. But we can get it to a much better state of health.''

Marine environments are in generally good condition. But there is substantial degradation in southern and eastern waters - including Victoria's seas - with ecosystems in bays and near coasts in generally poor health. Port Phillip Bay could be the marine ecosystem most invaded by foreign pests in the southern hemisphere.

With David Wroe

Protecting biodiversity would limit damage

Nicky Phillips 

The Age, December 12, 2011  

See also Biodiversity and climate change - from bad to worse (UNSW)

THE impact of climate change on Australia's animals and plants could be significantly reduced if other threats to biodiversity are managed, a new report says.

The review, the most detailed scientific paper on the impact of climate change on the region to date, says climate change is unavoidable because global emissions are not yet under control. Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific Islands are particularly vulnerable, it says.

The report's lead author, the conservation biologist Richard Kingsford, said the effects of global warming could be offset by more than half by reducing the impact of feral animals, pollution, habitat loss and other threats to Australia's ecosystems.

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Global warming will have consequences for all plant and animal species, from micro-organisms to large mammals living on land, in freshwater systems and the ocean, said Professor Kingsford, the director of the Australian wetlands and rivers centre at the University of NSW.

The review cites many independent scientific studies that demonstrate the effects of global warming on biodiversity, and its projected impact.

Rising temperatures will exceed some species' tolerance, especially in alpine regions, while increases in fire and drought will alter vegetation, favouring grasslands over trees and woodlands.

Rising sea levels will have a significant impact on low-lying islands, especially in the Pacific, while an increase in ocean acidification will affect marine animals with calcified skeletons.

"Ultimately we are dependent on biodiversity for our livelihood," Professor Kingsford said. "Plants provide the oxygen we need; the water we get from rivers is supported by catchments filled with plants and animals, and most of our food is supported by biodiversity."

Already many changes among animals and plants have been observed, Professor Kingsford said, such as coral bleaching, altered flowering patterns and shifts in the migration times of animals, particularly birds.

The last resort to prevent extinction for some species would mean relocation to a new habitat, he said.