UK experts commented on the release of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Working Group 2, Summary for Policy Makers. This document is the second of three summaries of the 4th assessment report released in 2007. It focused on the impacts, adaptation and vulnerability to climate change.
Martin Rees, president of the Royal Society, said:
“This is another wake up call for governments, industry and individuals. We now have a clearer indication of the potential impact of global warming, some of which is already inevitable. Man made carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gas emissions are the key factor driving this growing problem and we can do something about them. With every passing day when they are not being reduced we draw closer to the more severe scenarios outlined in the report. Some of the harmful changes outlined in the report are already manifesting. The challenge is now to support those people living in the most vulnerable areas so that they are able to adapt and improve their ways of life.”
Dr. Mike Morecroft, from the Centre for Ecology & Hydrology, said:
“This report is based on the results of hundreds of individual scientific studies. The IPCC is putting together the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle and we are now beginning to see the picture that is emerging. The last 5 years have produced compelling evidence that the natural world is beginning to show the first effects of climate change. There is clear evidence of some of the more mobile species like butterflies shifting further north and to higher altitudes and of seasonal events, like trees coming into leaf, happening earlier in the year. We can see these changes in Britain as well as globally.
“Changes in ecosystems are likely to become much more serious in future. In the UK the effects of changes in rainfall patterns may be at least as serious as those of rising temperatures. We need to start adapting nature conservation to climate change. This means, for example, enabling species to disperse more easily across the landscape and protecting larger areas where species populations will tend to be more resilient.
“Uncertainty is a real issue but it is no excuse for inaction. The uncertainty concerns the nature of the problem not the fact of it. Uncertainty needs to be factored into adaptation planning and it makes ongoing monitoring and research vital, but it also makes it even more urgent to address the underlying problem of rising greenhouse gas concentrations.”
Dr Tim Sparks, environmental scientist at the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, said:
“The authors of this new report have reviewed a huge volume of scientific evidence from right across the world. They conclusively show that plants and animals, in the oceans and on the land, have already been affected by rising temperatures. If ever there was an alarm bell, then this is it. The authors give dire warnings, such as extinctions of a quarter of the Earth’s species, unless we collectively and effectively act to reduce harmful emissions into the atmosphere.”
Dr Dave Reay, School of GeoSciences, University of Edinburgh, said:
“The prediction that ‘terrestrial ecosystems are highly likely to become net sources of carbon in the latter half the 21st Century’ may not grab the headlines. But it should. The planet’s vegetation and soils are locking away around 1 billion of the more than 6 billion tonnes of carbon we are adding to the atmosphere every year. Turning this huge sink for carbon into a source would amplify global climate change and counteract efforts to cut our own emissions. Terrestrial ecosystems must be protected from the impacts of climate change in the future, and that means protecting them from chainsaws and ploughs today.”
Professor Neil Adger, Convening Lead Author in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Working Group Report on Impacts Adaptation and Vulnerability and Professor in the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research, University of East Anglia, said:
“The new IPCC report shows that there are no winners from the impacts of climate change. No country is immune. And the losers, in terms of human health, misery, relocation and uncertainty, are not compensated for by some marginal and as yet unrealised increased productivity in forests, fish or specific yields in agricultural crops.
“The report presents unequivocal evidence on the details of how the natural world is already being impacted by rising temperature and changing rainfall patterns. All around the world, from retreating glaciers, through to earlier fish migrations in rivers, the impacts of climate change are upon us.
“But the report also provides stark evidence of how people are being affected and who is most vulnerable to expected impacts in the future. Poor and marginalised people are most at risk from flooding, rising sea levels and wild weather. This is true for Europe and for the US, as the Hurricane Katrina experience shows. The vulnerability of poor and marginalised people and places is all the more urgent for developing countries.
“For the first time, the IPCC has looked across the globe and concludes that young children and elderly are vulnerable in every country, particularly to heatwaves and extreme weather.
“Adaptation is necessary but not a panacea. The Report highlights new observations that adaptation is occurring now – local governments and individual farmers, home owners and water and insurance companies are all changing their locations, business practices and policies.
“At present, efforts at adaptation are nowhere near sufficient, but the IPCC highlights many barriers to making society more resilient to the inevitable changes in the world’s climate.”
Dr Rachel Warren, Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research, Contributing Author on Chapter 4, Impacts of Climate Change on Ecosystems and lead author on ‘Long-Term Aspects of Mitigation’, to be published later with working group 3, said:
“The capacity of many ecosystems to adapt naturally will be exceeded this century by an unprecedented combination of climate change, associated disturbances ( e.g., acidification and warming of oceans, flooding, drought, melting of sea ice, wildfire, insects), and other global change drivers ( e.g., land-use change, pollution, over exploitation of fisheries).
“Effects of climate change upon ecosystems are already occurring for example with changes in spring phenology, localised coral bleaching episodes and reductions in krill populations, at the base of the food chain in the Southern Ocean.
“Climate change impacts on ecosystems escalate rapidly once global temperature rise approaches 2 degrees above the pre-industrial. Coral reefs (most bleached worldwide at 2C and converted to algal mats at 3C), Arctic ecosystems (40-100% Arctic summer sea ice lost between 2.5-3C endangering polar bear; large losses of tundra area), and mountaintop ecosystems are most at risk.
“Climate change will damage biodiversity hotspots worldwide, with high risks that large percentages of species therein will be committed to extinction, these percentages rising with temperature.”
Professor Andrew Watkinson, Deputy Director of the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research, and Review Editor of Chapter 1, Observations, said:
“There is now clear evidence that physical and biological systems on all continents and in some oceans are being affected by recent climate changes. The most impressive aspect of this report is the accumulating evidence for changes in the distribution and phenology of species that can be related to rising temperatures. This vast array of data has allowed a large scale statistical analysis to demonstrate that the observed changes, which are consistent with warming, are very unlikely to be due to natural variability in temperatures. The conclusion is that anthropogenic warming is having a marked influence on many physical and biological systems.”
The Centre for Alternative Technology (CAT)’s Development Director, Paul Allen, said:
“The challenges facing the world are now so massive and unprecedented that they can no longer be considered in isolation. We must link climate change, energy security and global equity into a single issue with an integrated solution. There are reactions to climate change, such as a global dash for gas, which increase energy insecurities. There are solutions to depleting oil reserves, such as a massive switch back to coal, which accelerate climate change, and using inappropriate global trading to try to solve global equity will exacerbate both climate change and energy security. These kinds of measures – solving one challenge at the expense of another simply will not do. The key to success is to solve the three main challenges together.”
Dr Kevin Hiscock, Senior Lecturer, School of Environmental Sciences, University of East Anglia, said:
“Alarmingly, the weight of evidence shows that climate change will affect the distribution of freshwater globally resulting in potentially a third of the world’s population facing increased water scarcity by the 2050s. This points to an impending water crisis this century that must be tackled by better governance of water resources at all levels.
“Climate change impacts on the cryosphere and hydrological cycle will lead to more frequent and severe floods and droughts this century that will affect people’s livelihoods and well-being. Especially vulnerable areas are the heavily-populated mega-delta regions of South, East and Southeast Asia. Here, increased flooding from rivers and sea-level rise presents an acute humanitarian challenge affecting hundreds of millions of people, a situation we simply cannot ignore.
“The combination of forced climate change impacts and the over-exploitation of already scarce freshwater resources in many parts of the world, particularly in relation to irrigation water demand for food production, is a stark reminder of the need for global action now to avoid impending water scarcity this century.”
Dr Sue Ion, Vice President of the Royal Academy of Engineering, said:
“Today we see the publication of the much-trailed IPCC Working Group II report. With contributions from many of the world’s leading authorities on the science of climate change, it is a timely reinforcement of the need to take action to adapt to and mitigate what could otherwise be devastating consequences for our planet.
“Adaptation to the impacts of climate change will be necessary in the future and early mitigation could help reduce the level if adaptation required. Both will rely heavily on the knowledge and skills of the engineering community for their implementation.
“Fortunately the Government has recognised the importance of the issue and the need for the UK to take a leadership position in proactively reducing CO2 emissions.
“However, the challenge ahead must not be underestimated. It is not just a matter of setting targets. Much greater appreciation is required in Government of the challenges ahead from an engineering perspective to deliver the necessary technologies and infrastructure. There are significant concerns in the engineering community that too little attention has been paid to the practicalities, investment timetable and the availability of essential resources. We are in danger of setting totally unrealistic early targets and hence failing to secure a deliverable plan for the long term.”
Prof Robert Nicholls, Convening Lead Author in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Report on Impacts Adaptation and Vulnerability and Professor of Civil Engineering and the Environment, Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research, University of Southampton, said:
“The new IPCC report shows that coastal areas highly threatened by climate change and there is urgent need for action.
“Coasts are already experiencing the adverse consequences of hazards related to climate and sea level. They are highly vulnerable to extreme events, such as storms which impose substantial costs on coastal societies. Annually, about 120 million people are exposed to tropical cyclones, killing 250,000 people from1980 to 2000. Through the 20th Century, global rise of sea level contributed to increased coastal inundation, erosion and ecosystem losses, but with considerable local and regional variation due to other factors. Late 20th Century effects of rising temperature include loss of sea ice, thawing of permafrost and associated coastal retreat, and more frequent coral bleaching and mortality.
“Coasts will be exposed to increasing risks over coming decades due to rising sea level and many compounding climate-change factors. Anticipated climate-related changes by 2100 include: an accelerated rise in sea level of up to 0.6 m or more; further rise in sea surface temperatures by up to 3oC; an intensification of tropical and extra-tropical cyclones; larger extreme waves and storm surges; altered precipitation/run-off; and ocean acidification. These phenomena will vary considerably at regional and local scales, but the impacts are virtually certain to be overwhelmingly negative. Corals are especially threatened with increased bleaching and mortality due to rising sea surface temperatures. Increased flooding and the degradation of freshwater, fisheries and other resources due to climate change could impact hundreds of millions of people.
“The impact of climate change on coasts is exacerbated by growing human populations and pressures. Coastal population is booming and it may reach 5 billion people by the 2080s. Populated deltas (especially Asian and African megadeltas), low-lying coastal urban areas, and atolls are key societal hotspots of coastal vulnerability, occurring where the stresses on natural systems coincide with low human adaptive capacity and high exposure. Regionally, south, south-east and east Asia, Africa and small islands are most vulnerable.
“Adaptation for the coasts of developing countries will be more challenging than for coasts of developed countries. These countries lack the necessary financial and other resources/capacities to adapt, so their vulnerability is much greater than a developed nation in an identical coastal setting. Vulnerability will also vary between developing countries, while developed countries are not insulated from the adverse consequences of extreme events as illustrated by Hurricane Katrina.
“Adaptation costs for vulnerable coasts are much less than the costs of inaction. Adaptation costs for climate change are much lower than damage costs without adaptation for most developed coasts, just considering property losses and human deaths. Without adaptation, the high-end sea-level scenarios combined with other climate change (e.g., increased storm intensity) are as likely as not to render some islands and low-lying areas uninhabitable by 2100, so effective adaptation measures are urgently required.
“Sea-level rise has substantial inertia and will continue beyond 2100 for many centuries with long-term impacts. Irreversible breakdown of the West Antarctica and/or Greenland ice sheets could make this long-term rise significantly larger, ultimately questioning the viability of many coastal settlements across the globe. Settlement patterns also have substantial inertia, and this issue presents a challenge for long-term coastal spatial planning. Stabilisation of climate by reducing greenhouse emissions could reduce the risks of ice sheet breakdown, and reduce but not stop sea-level rise due to thermal expansion. Hence, the most appropriate response to sea-level rise for coastal areas is a combination of adaptation to deal with the inevitable rise, and mitigation to limit the long-term rise to a manageable level. “