Climate change is already having visible effects on the world. The Earth is warming, rainfall patterns are changing, and sea levels are rising. These changes can increase the risk of heatwaves, floods, droughts, and fires.
Hilary Canto contacted The Met Office to see if we could get a better idea of climate trends for our local area. This was their kind reply:
"We have produced various predictions of the effect of climate change on the UK, usefully summed up in the UKCP report and in the climate change pages on our website. It might also be useful to review the government’s latest Climate Change Risk Assessment, which is more focused on the risks climate change poses to the UK.
Briefly, by the end of the 21st century, all areas of the UK are projected to be warmer, more so in summer than in winter. The temperature of hot summer days, by the 2070s, show increases of 3.7 °C to 6.8 °C, under a high emissions scenario, along with an increase in the frequency of hot spells. Despite overall summer drying trends in the future, UKCP data suggests future increases in the intensity of heavy summer rainfall events and significant increases in heavy rainfall intensity in the autumn. Winters are projected to become up to 33% wetter than today and up to 4.2°C warmer. We see these trends in observational data today and they will continue if we keep emitting greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.
The effects of these changes are numerous and include increased flood risk, changes in seasonality affecting crops, potential damage to infrastructure and problems with heat stress.
Hopefully this information will be of use in planning your climate crisis activities. I would encourage you to review the sources I have given above and, for a more general view, I would refer you to recent IPCC reports, including their most recent Assessment Report (AR5) and their Special Report on the effects 1.5°C of warming would have on the world. Recent trends in the climate of the UK are also presented together in the latest State of the UK Climate report, available here."
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