Climate change: what's in store where you live?
South East:
March to August 2003 were the warmest months on record in the UK and included the country’s hottest temperature ever of 38.5°C at Brogdale in Kent.
The South East is especially vulnerable to the detrimental effects of climate change. Average temperature and sea levels have already risen – and are expected to go up even further. Increasingly frequent storms will combine with a greater risk of summer droughts to further polarise the seasons.
The South East receives less rainfall than any other region in the UK: it has less water available per person than Spain or Greece. As a result, the area is heavily dependent on groundwater to provide its drinking water supplies. Water resources are already overstretched and there are limited opportunities to extract more water from groundwater sources without damaging the environment.
Most of the South East’s major centres of population are on coastal flood plains, making them very vulnerable to floods and extreme weather events. Government plans to develop more housing on flood plains have attracted criticism in the wake of the recent flash floods. The pressures of an expanding population will place the climate under even greater strain.
MPs have expressed concern that emissions from the housing sector “could constitute more than 55% of the UK’s target for carbon emissions in 2050, nearly doubling the current 30% contribution.” Pressure for more housing and other developments in the area also means that transport, the fastest growing source of greenhouse gases in the UK, will expand.
The South East Climate Change Partnership estimates that by 2080 summer temperatures will have risen by up to 6°C, and winter rainfall is expected to increase by up to 30%. In agricultural terms, this translates to between 40 and 100 extra days of plant growth per year.
Sea level rises will mean more pressure on coast lines. Planning will have to take account of more likely extreme and distressing events and seek to protect sensitive areas, both natural and man-made. The severe flooding experienced by people living in Sussex and Kent in 2000 demonstrated the acute personal, social and economic costs associated with such events.
Across southern England, estuaries and low coastal land could be inundated. Eroding cliffs will retreat ever faster as rising tides and more vigorous waves and storms rip at their exposed faces. Further inland, hotter, drier summers will put the local oak and beech woodlands at risk. The Sussex water meadows may also be adversely affected. Redshanks, Lapwings and other wading birds will increasingly find their habitats threatened by rising sea levels and ever-drier land.
Find out what's in store elsewhere in the UK:
