Britain should prepare for massive loss of landmass, warn engineers

UK should change building design, transport and energy infrastructure ahead of climate change and high sea levels

by Terry Macalister, The Guardian, February 12, 2009

Engineers fear London could be submerged as the climate changes. Photograph: Jason Hawkes/Barcroft Media.

Ministers should prepare the British people to "adapt" in the longer term to a landscape devastated by climate change, including the possible abandonment of parts of London and East Anglia, a leading industry body warns today.

Action to curb carbon emissions is failing, so the UK should immediately change the way it designs buildings, transport and energy infrastructure in preparation for a world potentially characterised by extreme heat and high sea levels, argues the Institution of Mechanical Engineers (IMechE) in a new report.

The institute said it wanted its latest research to provoke serious action for future planning "not just for the sake of our planet but also for the human race. Yes, we need to mitigate [emissions] – but the evidence shows this is not working alone."

Even with significant global commitment to avert climate change it could be many centuries before average temperatures can be stabilised, says the document, "Climate Change: Adapting to the Inevitable?", which was described by environmentalists as a "wake-up call" for government.

IMechE said that sea levels are predicted to rise by 2 m by 2250 and 7 m by the end of that century.

"A seven-metre rise in sea levels would impact on vast areas of the UK, including parts of London which border the Thames, [such as] Canary Wharf, Chelsea and Westminster, all of which would need to be abandoned," the report argues.

Although they were long-term predictions, the authors say Britain should be preparing for change today, and they questioned whether Britain should be considering new nuclear power stations at places such as Sizewell on the Suffolk coast.

Tim Fox, head of environment and climate change at the IMechE and one of the authors of the publication, denied that the institute was being alarmist or seeking to undermine actions against greenhouse gases. They were merely trying to be "pragmatic" engineers who needed to prepare for extreme scenarios, he said.

The action the members of IMechE want includes:

• Building new railways because many of the existing routes use valleys that could be flooded

• Building reservoirs underground to prevent evaporation

• Spending heavily on researching new forms of energy such as fusion

Environmentalists said the report was prescient. "If we don't take action quickly to reduce carbon emissiosns we could be facing catastrophic change. This could have long-term implications but the action needs to take place in the next few years," said Robin Webster, energy and climate change campaigner at Friends of the Earth.

Vicky Pope, head of climate change advice at the government's Meteorological Office, said she agreed with much of the IMechE report. "We clearly must continue with action against carbon emissions but adaptation is also important. The Climate Change Act puts into place policies which support people to assess risk and take action on adaptation," she added.

The climate change modelling used in the IMechE report was developed by the University of East Anglia and was in line with current international thinking, Fox said, claiming that politicians and others tended to be more focused on short-term actions without considering longer term consequences and solutions.

The British canal systems, the Forth Road Bridge and further afield the Panama Canal were projects that were constructed to last up to 250 years, and it was time that government considered what kind of infrastructure would be needed post-2100, especially as the Kyoto Protocol against climate change had produced no reduction in carbon output, he added.

IMechE said that even under less extreme circumstances there would be a need for decisions on the building or enhancement of flood defences or ultimately whether an area will be no longer fit for habitation. Fox said he realised that the current credit crunch made it difficult for governments to invest, but he said cash spent now would offer future savings.

Link to report (pdf file): http://www.imeche.org/NR/rdonlyres/CBF13D63-D8F5-483C-BB64-981D610F373B/0/IMechEAdaptationreport.pdf

Link to article: http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/feb/13/climate-change