Source: Channel 4 News
URL: N/A
Date: 02/11/2018
Event: Extreme weather: "the UK is in a race against time to adapt"
Credit: Channel 4 News
People:
Symeon Brown: These are the 76 mile-per-hour winds that we're told [?] that storm Callum brought to Britain. There was torrential rain, landslides and fatalities. This is the sheer devastation that so-called "Mother Nature" has caused in recent years, here on British shores. And an urgent new report from the Met Office has captured how our weather is becoming more extreme.
Mark McCarthy: This supplement, we're looking at particular weather extremes and documenting those, to get a greater detailed picture of our changing climate.
Symeon Brown: According to new data released by the Met Office, the heatwaves are getting longer, warm spells have more than doubled in length from 5.3 days to 13.2 days, the average temperature for the hottest day of the year is up, on average the coldest day of the year is getting less cold. Between 1961 and 1990, the average was minus 8.5 degrees but between 2008 and 2017 it was minus 6.8 degrees. And also rainfall is intensifying - total rainfall from extreme wet days has increased by 17%. As the season and the climate changes, the problem is the great challenge to policymakers does not.
Today's report is the latest to reveal how extreme weather is intensifying in Britain, with the heatwaves getting longer and the wet days getting wetter, and again there are two questions. What is the impact of this, and what needs to be done? To answer those questions is Baroness Brown, of the independent Committee on Climate Change, advising the government.
Baroness Brown: The death rates from heat are expected to go up from about 2,000 per annum at the moment to something like 5,000 per annum by 2050. And of course flooding is deleterious to all of us - I mean, it can shut down the Tube, it can spoil our homes, it can cause a lot of emotional distress for people, of course.
Symeon Brown: The objective [for] the government is how quickly can they get us to reduce the carbon we emit, or else. Today's report has renewed urgency to engage with climate change. With increased temperatures being identified as providing extra energy for storms like this, the UK is in a race against time to adapt.