Climate change adaptation
Energy policy statement 09/05
While reducing greenhouse gas emissions (mitigation) is a priority for the UK Government, in an international context the over-reliance the Government places on mitigation may not be a responsible and appropriate use of the nation’s limited resources.
In 2007 the UK produced just 2% of global CO2 emissions, which have in recent years been increasing at about 3% per annum. Therefore the UK is heavily reliant on other nations to significantly reduce their emissions to avoid dangerous and irreversible future climate change.
The UK is highly vulnerable to the potential effects of climate change, particularly sea level rise and an increase in impacts of extreme events such as flooding, drought and summer heatwaves.
Therefore the UK needs a long-term adaptation strategy, particularly as the engineering of infrastructure, networks and systems cannot be achieved at short notice.
Experience
Recent extreme weather events such as the heatwaves in summer 2003 and 2006, and the floods in 2007, 2008 and 2009, demonstrate some of the risks posed by climate change. The disruption caused to schools, hospitals and transport networks severely inconvenienced individuals, and businesses incurred significant costs.
Experience from the recent flooding suggests that well-planned action will reduce the costs for individuals, businesses and the Exchequer. It is likely to be far cheaper in the long run to engineer infrastructure and the built environment now to be resilient to a changing climate, rather than rebuilding or re-engineering later.
The Government has acknowledged that the UK must adapt to climate change that will occur as a result of past emissions as well as that which is forecast, but public funding for UK adaptation activity is currently small. By comparison the UK spends large sums on international adaptation.
Key recommendations
The Institution urges the Government to:
- Make investment decisions in the consideration of long-term viability and risk, by taking a longer view and assessing infrastructure and the built environment in terms of several hundreds of years;
- Lead research into adaptation that considers worst-case scenarios and assumes global mitigation is largely ineffective, so that the nation can manage risk and increase resilience;
- Substantially increase its investment in adaptation research.
Download the full policy statement.
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