The UK’s Met Office has come up with a range of climate change predictions, which indicate that the UK could be between 2 degrees and 6 degrees hotter than it is now by the end of the century, with lower amounts of summer rainfall in the south (good for cricket but bad for crops and gardening) and wetter winters in the north. The Environment Secretary, Mr Benn comments that we need to plan now for these weather changes. He is wrong. We should have started planning fifteen years ago.
Of course predicting future climate with accuracy is an almost impossible task. Certainly hotter climates for the United Kingdom with less summer rain seem fairly safe predictions, although, as with all toxins, the poison is in the dose, rather than in the substance.
Mr Benn has pointed to the need to increase flood defences, protect infrastructure, such as railway lines and sewers and drains, and all these things are important.
However, we should not lose sight of equally important matters in planning for what is likely to be a future with greater extremes of weather, in terms of rainfall, but otherwise generally hotter.
If you are replacing your guttering, it might be worth investing in broader guttering to take the heavier downpours that will become more frequent. You then have to consider whether your storm drains can cope with the extra water. Planning authorities will have to carefully consider how much paving for car parking to permit, as opposed to other means which will allow water to percolate through the soil. Buildings designed for the elderly will probably need smaller windows than at present to keep the hotter heat out. Architects and designers and planners will all have to learn about climate change and designing buildings to take account of the likely effects of it.
That might be hard when most of them do not appear to know one end of a solar panel from another.
Filed under: carbon emissions, climate change, global warming, heat, solar, solar energy, solar panels, weather | Tagged: designing for climate change, Uk weather and climate change |
Robert Kyriakides's Weblog 
[…] these weather changes. He is wrong. We should have started planning fifteen years ago. Of course Go to Source Leave a comment Related PostsJune 20, 2009 — ashes fact 18 (0)June 19, 2009 — new (0)June […]
I don’t believe the UK will be as badly affected as other places. Read about what they are doing in the Canary Islands on our latest blog post.
Would those future extremes include “warming” on a “global” scale?
If the heat can’t be reflected back into space as radiation, it ahs got to go somewhere.
Robert
Maybe we could install small turbines in drain pipes to generate electricity from the water flowing through them.
I an’t see that working, but let’s do waht we know works – like installing soalr panels.
“we should have statred planning fifteen years ago” – OF COURSE! But we never do because of short-termism and annual budgets, etc,. along with a hefty dose of plain old stupidity – duh!
One small thing they’ve been talking about for a hundred years, but do NOTHING about (no change there from governments then, eh?) – a national grid for water in the UK. In Tenerife, in the south, it hardly ever rains (although it very occasionally absolutely throws it down), but there’s not much of a water problem because it rains in the north and on Mount Teide. So, collect the water where it falls and distribute it to where it doesn’t – that’s real rocket science, isn’t it? I mean, you’d need at least a degree in quantum mechanics to figure that one out!
It an interesting thought about short-termism; did the Victorians build the sewers out of a desure to improve the public health of future generations or simply because the smells became too much to bear? Will we only start planning when the changes are too much to bear?
Robert
Robert,
Nick Griffin (Leader of the BNP) suggests that climate change is just a hoax and the more important concern is that we need more fuel to burn here in ‘England’ !
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/blog/2009/jun/09/climate-change-oil
I don’t agree with him on this point.
\it is know that the short termism is well and truly deposited in the British monetary system, the 100% + mortgages should spell 100 year mortgages like some lenders in Germany.
Transporting the water from where it falls has been done many years ago, the Manchester water works back in the early 20 th century made is so with the Haweswater dam and the destruction of one of the most stunning vallies in then Westmoreland now Cumbria, the water travells via gravity through the 96 miles pipeline, check out, http://www.mardale.green.talktalk.net for the bigger picture.
If anyone has ever seen the film A Crude Awakening then you should understand what is a foot, one snippett of information that really brings things to the afray, is, a single barrel of crude 42 gallons, produces the same energy to that od 12 people working for a whole year, once we start approaching the back end of oil, there is plenty of people around to do that work.
Let all those who are saying that global warming is nonscense and contributing to that warming, let them do the work once they have used up the last drop of oil let them repent by doing the work that it gave.
As the song says, the answer my freind is blowing in the wind and flowing down the rivers of the country, yet we let is pass us by, many smaller units like water powered mills is a much safer backdrop, to the large power plant that goes down due to lack of fuel, the former is coming free from the gods and the one which will save us some embarrasment later.
Most government are pretty good at acting after the act has come to pass, they know what to do before hand but never do, we will have to taking some of our own power needs into our own hands, if we tried to stop the standby next day Brittain, it would help, less can be more, especially for our future generations, we at least owe them that.
If we put aside instead of setting things aside we could use that land to produce crops for fuel, giving someone something for nothing is costing us, when it could be giving us valuble energy, if we have any mountains let it be our own, instead of using energy transporting other energies from one country to another, its time to start putting some of these policies into action, instead of talking about it.
On a closing note we are what we eat, if you don’t eat you don’t shite and the work doesn’t get done, food is the key here, we are now past the piont at which our immediate enviornment can support us without oil, once its gone or hard to get, about a third of the world population is ubder immediate threat, three meals away fro disaster, that’s how long it took to empty the shelves.
I is know that the short termism is well and truly deposited in the British monetary system, the 100% + mortgages should spell 100 year mortgages like some lenders in Germany do.
Transporting the water from where it falls to where its needed has already been done, the Manchester water works did this back in the early 20 th century made with theHaweswater act of 1919, with a dam and the destruction of one of the most stunning vallies in then Westmoreland now Cumbria, the water travels via gravity through the 96 miles pipeline, check it out here, http://www.mardale.green.talktalk.net
If anyone has ever seen the film A Crude Awakening then you should understand what is a foot, one snippett of information that really brings things to light is, A single barrel of crude 42 gallons, provides the same energy to that of 12 people all working for a whole year, once we start approaching the back end of oil, there will be plenty of people around to do that work.
Let all those who are saying that global warming is nonscense and contributing to that warming, let them do the work once they have used up the last drop of oil let them repent by doing that work.
As the song says, the answer my freind is blowing in the wind and flowing down the rivers of the country, yet we let is pass us by, many smaller units like water powered mills is a much safer backdrop, to the large power plant that goes down due to lack of fuel, the former is coming free from the gods and the one which will save us some embarrasment later by acting now.
Most government are pretty good at acting after the act has come to pass, they know what to do before hand but never do, we will have to start taking some of our own power needs into our own hands, if we tried to stop the standby next day Brittain it would help, less can most definately be more, especially for our future generations, we at least owe them that.
If we put things aside instead of setting things aside we could use that land to produce crops for fuel, giving someone something for nothing is costing us all, when it could be giving us back valuble energy, if we have any mountains let it be our own, instead of using energy transporting other energies from one country to another, its time to start putting some of these policies into action, instead of talking about it, today, turn off that TV, video, DVD, that you have on stand by.
On a closing note we are what we eat, if we don’t eat we don’t shite and the work doesn’t get done, food is the key here, we are now past the piont at which our immediate enviornment can support us, without oil, once its gone or hard to get, about a third of the world population is under immediate threat,ever heard the saying that we are three meals away from disaster, that’s how long it took to empty the shelves last time, if this doen’t get you thinking then go join the BNP.