England’s coastal communities haven’t faced up to the reality of rising seas through climate change, a report says. An increase of at least 1m is almost certain at some point in the future, the government’s advisors predict. The Committee on Climate Change (CCC) warns this huge rise may happen over the next 80 years – within the lifetimes of today’s children. A government spokesman said the public would be protected from the impacts of climate change. But the CCC says current shoreline management plans are unfunded and hopelessly optimistic.
BBC 26th Oct 2018 read more »
Thousands of coastal homes will have to be sacrificed because it is too expensive to protect them from rising sea levels and erosion, according to a climate change advisory body. Many more homes will drop in value when it becomes clear that they will not be protected by new seawalls and defences, the Committee on Climate Change said. Climate change will “almost certainly” cause sea levels to rise by at least a metre. This could happen by 2100, which is “within the lifetimes of today’s children”, the body said in a report on risks to the English coast.
Times 26th Oct 2018 read more »
Rising sea levels will put 1.5m properties at risk of coastal flooding while those threatened by coastal erosion will rise almost 15 times by 2085 compared with today, the Committee on Climate Change has warned. A report by the CCC found that it would be uneconomical to protect about 1,600km of coast – or 29 per cent of the English coastline – if sea levels rose by an expected 1 metre by the end of this century.
FT 26th Oct 2018 read more »
The iNews 26th Oct 2018 read more »
Guardian 26th Oct 2018 read more »
Independent 26th Oct 2018 read more »
There is also a possibility of accelerated ice sheet melt – and, thus, higher sea level rise than 1m – in the absence of more mitigation on climate change, Professor Jim Hall, who leads on flooding and coastal erosion at the CCC, tells Carbon Brief. “What we’re talking about here very much has a global mitigation context,” he says. Losses from coastal erosion and flooding are already being felt today, the CCC says, with damages amounting to an average £260m per year. There are 520,000 properties in England in areas at risk from coastal flooding and 8,900 properties are in areas at risk of being lost through coastal erosion, the CCC adds.
Carbon Brief 26th Oct 2018 read more »
Scotland is leading the way in helping businesses build the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals into their everyday business models for the benefit of us and the planet. The scale of environmental, social and economic challenge facing humanity is enormous, with a real urgency to act. Scotland was one of the first countries to adopt the global targets of the United Nations’ 17 Sustainable Development Goals. These are a universal call to action for all countries to tackle poverty and inequality, protect the planet and ensure peace, prosperity and justice for all. “This vision is underpinned by the Scottish Environment Protection Agency’s (SEPA) own regulatory strategy, One Planet Prosperity, which aims to deliver environmental protection and improvement in ways which help communities and businesses thrive within the resources of our planet,” explains SEPA’s head of innovation, Catherine Preston.
Herald 25th Oct 2018 read more »