Enews for April 2012

  1. Changes at UKCIP
  2. Temperature data update – but warming trend continues
  3. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) – report on extremes
  4. Climate-Adapt launches – the EU online platform for adaptation information
  5. Climate UK renews focus as bridge between national and local
  6. Adaptation Sub-Committee to conduct review into CCRA
  7. Business could do better on adaptation
  8. News round-up
  9. Adaptation events

1. Changes at UKCIP

At the end of March, UKCIP said farewell to a number of its staff, and to the work it had been doing to support the government’s adaptation policy. This work, along with the staff responsible for it, has now been wholly transferred to the Environment Agency. While we are sad to see our colleagues leave, the remaining team at UKCIP is continuing its work of supporting adaptation in the UK and further afield, with some new activities just beginning. More details below.

E-news will continue, with a remit to share information of interest to the UK adaptation community. It will take its inspiration from the work of researchers, policy-makers and adaptation practitioners from around the world.

ARCC Co-ordination Network (ARCC CN) gets enhanced role

The Co-ordination Network for the EPSRC’s Adaptation and Resilience to Climate Change (ARCC) programme has recently adopted an enhanced role, thanks to additional funding from EPSRC. ARCC CN will now incorporate: broadening the Network to include other built environment and infrastructure research projects and their stakeholders; enhanced engagement opportunities to strengthen the impacts of research; an increasing focus on adaptation and resilience of infrastructure; and an activity to provide a single portal for outputs, data and tools from across the ARCC CN portfolio. These activities will run for the remainder of the ARCC CN contract, to 31 July 2013, and two new posts to help to deliver this work will be advertised shortly.

Knowledge exchange boost for Oxford climate research

Dr Peter Walton has been appointed to UKCIP as Knowledge Exchange Research Fellow. Although based at UKCIP, this two-year appointment will be work across the range of climate research within the University of Oxford. This post will develop effective links between researchers and the users of climate research, based on the UKCIP model of stakeholder engagement and enhancing the impacts of research.

Living with environmental change (LWEC) Fellowship at UKCIP

Roger Street has been appointed LWEC Climate Challenge Fellow, based at UKCIP. He will work at the boundary between the research base and decision-makers in policy, business and society who are trying to understand how they might be affected by and respond to a changing climate. This fellowship will focus on better understanding what information enables decision-making, exploring interactions with decision-makers and across the research base to enable the development of decision-relevant tools and information.

2. Temperature data update – but warming trend continues

Researchers have updated an important series of data on global temperature (HadCRUT), with more information about temperature from the Arctic region now incorporated. HadCRUT is one of the main sources of global temperature information. The updates do not show a change to the general warming trend, but there has been some revision of the warmest years, with 2010 now shown as the warmest on record, rather than 1998.

3. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) – report on extremes

The IPCC’s latest report – Special Report on Managing the Risks of Extreme Events and Disasters to Advance Climate Change Adaptation (SREX) – suggests that climate change has already led to changes in climate extremes such as heat waves, high temperatures and heavy precipitation. Chris Field, who helped to produce the report, said “The main message from the report is that we know enough to make good decisions about managing the risks of climate-related disasters”. The report notes that policies to respond to the risks of disaster can reduce the impact of extreme events and increase resilience, but there are limits to resilience, when thresholds or tipping points are reached, posing severe challenges for adaptation.

4. Climate-Adapt launches – the EU online platform for adaptation information

Climate-Adapt, the European Union’s online portal for adaptation information launched late last month. Climate-Adapt will support Europe’s adaptors by enabling them to access and share information on: climate change in Europe, vulnerability of regions and sectors, national and transnational adaptation strategies, case studies, adaptation options, and tools that support adaptation planning. Organisations can also submit their own contributions to the site.

5. Climate UK renews focus as bridge between national and local

The organisation representing climate change activities in the devolved administrations and English regions has launched its new work programme. Climate UK has a renewed focus on developing a national response to climate change, tailored to reflect local circumstances, risks and opportunities.

6. Adaptation Sub-Committee to conduct review into CCRA

The Adaptation Sub-Committee of the Committee on Climate Change has commissioned an independent review of the UK’s recently-launched Climate Change Risk Assessment (CCRA), to look at the methodology and results. It is also developing a toolkit to assess the effectiveness of the National Adaptation Programme in addressing the risks outlined in the CCRA.

7. Business could do better on adaptation

Defra has published a summary of the 100 or so submissions it received in response to its request to selected businesses and organisations to report on their climate change adaptation efforts. The overall message from Defra is that for the most part, organisations that reported are assessing their climate risks and taking steps to adapt, although there is variation across and within sectors. Defra says that it will be working with those organisations that reported in its development of the National Adaptation Programme.

At the same time, Defra also released the outputs of research it commissioned from the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP). This showed that 80 per cent of FTSE 100 companies surveyed identified substantial risks to their business from climate change, but only 46 per cent had included adaptation in their business strategies. Defra’s Lord Taylor invited investors and shareholders to keep the pressure on to encourage businesses to prepare for climate change in order to achieve long-term growth.

8. News round-up

Lots of interesting adaptation snippets – so here’s a quick guide:

  • Latest news from climateprediction.net suggests that a global temperature rise of 3 degrees C is as plausible as a rise of 1.4 degrees C by mid-century.
  • Animal species are assumed to move northwards to find suitable habitats as climate changes, but new research suggests that birds and butterflies are unable to keep pace. See the European Commission website for further details.
  • The new Centre for Carbon Measurement will assist climate modellers in looking at future climate and its impacts. See related article on BBC website.

9. Adaptation events

  • Adaptation Futures, the 2012 international conference on adaptation, will be held in Arizona, USA, on 29-31 May 2012. It will bring together researchers, policy makers, and practitioners from developed and developing countries to share insights into the challenges and opportunities that adaptation presents. For details go to the Adaptation Futures event website.
  • Adaptation meets research is the theme of the Second Nordic International Conference on Climate Change Adaptation. It will be held in Helsinki, Finland, on 29-31 August 2012. Full details are available from the Nordic International Conference event website.
  • CIRCLE-2 Joint Initiative on Climate Uncertainties is holding a Workshop on Uncertainty and Climate Change Adaptation, at the University of Lisbon, Portugal on 8-9 November 2012. The workshop will be based around the question: how do decision-making processes on climate change adaptation, at the multi-decadal timescale, envision the future and deal with related uncertainties? Prospective participants are invited to submit an abstract by 1 June. For more details go to the CIRCLE-2 website.