Houses on the East Coast of England, photographed in 2020. On Tuesday, the chief executive of the UK’s Environment Agency said climate change meant some coastal communities would have to relocate.
Owen Humphries | PA Images | Getty Images
The chief executive of the UK’s Environment Agency has issued a dire warning to coastal communities, acknowledging that the effects of climate change will force people – in the UK and abroad – to relocate due to rising sea levels and coastal erosion .
In what James Bevan described as “the hardest of all inconvenient truths”, he said that in the long term, climate change means “some of our communities, in this country and around the world, cannot live where they are.” “
“That’s because while we can safely return and build better after most river floods, there’s no coming back for land that has been taken away by coastal erosion or that has been washed away by rising sea levels.” have been put permanently, or often, under water,” he said. ,
Rising sea levels threaten many coastal communities around the world, including island nations in the Pacific and Indian Oceans.
In a speech at the COP26 climate change summit last year, the Maldivian president sought to highlight the crisis facing his country, an archipelago made up of 1,192 islands.
“Our islands are gradually being submerged by the sea,” said Ibrahim Mohamed Solih. “If we do not change this trend, the Maldives will not exist until the end of this century.”
Meanwhile, in the US, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration warned in February that sea levels along the country’s coasts were expected to rise by about a foot on average by 2050. This is equal to the growth measured over the past 100 years.
The UK’s Bevan, speaking at a conference in Telford, Shropshire on Tuesday, argued that “in some places the correct answer – in economic, strategic, humanitarian terms – would be to move communities away from danger, rather than increasing To try and protect them from the inevitable effects of sea level rise.”
In additional comments released on the UK government website, Bevan said the effects of climate change “will continue to worsen.” He added that it is “inevitable that at some point some of our communities will have to withdraw from the coast.”
in May, World Meteorological Organization said Global mean sea level “reached a new record high in 2021, rising by an average of 4.5 mm per year over the 2013-2021 period.”
This, the WMO said, “more than doubled the rate between 1993 and 2002” and was “primarily due to the accelerated loss of ice mass from the ice sheets”.
Apart from increasing “vulnerability to tropical cyclones”, it is likely to have “major implications for millions of coastal residents”.
Britain’s plan
Bevan was speaking on the same day his agency released the Flood and Coastal Erosion Risk Management Strategy Roadmap.
Covering the period up to 2026, the roadmap outlines plans to ensure that “the country is resilient and prepared to respond and adapt to floods and coastal change.”
Among other things, the plan will focus on:
- Develop a “new national assessment of flood risk” focused on oceans, rivers and surface waters.
- Work on improving the Environment Agency’s digital tools so people can view their flood risk and sign up for flood warnings.
- Work with the Town and Country Planning Association to put together training materials with the goal of promoting “skills and abilities” related to development planning and flood risk.
This 2018 image shows the properties of a cliff edge off the coast of Norfolk, England. Rising sea levels and coastal erosion threaten many coastal communities around the world.
Joe Giddens | PA Images | Getty Images
In his speech, Bevan acknowledged that any type of community relocation would be controversial, but sought to allay fears of such a move being imminent.
He stressed that the objective should be focused on ensuring that wherever possible, coastal communities remain where they were and thrive.
“I think that, with the right interventions in the years to come, we can achieve as far as any of us can reasonably guess for most of the coastal communities in this country,” he said.
“It’s too early to say which communities need to move in due course, too short of a decision to make,” Bevan said.
Also, when a decision is taken, the views of the people living in the risk zones have to be considered.
“No one should be forcibly evicted from their homes against their will,” he said. “But – and there is one but – we need to start a conversation about all of this right now.”
‘Honest conversation’
Among those who responded to the UK Environment Agency’s announcement and Bevan’s message was Jim Hall, professor of climate and environmental risk at the University of Oxford.
“Even if the Environment Agency could build coast protection everywhere—which they couldn’t—the things that many people cherish about beaches, like beaches and sand dunes, will eventually become submerged, unless we start planning now how the coastline can accommodate rising sea levels,” he said.
“There is a need for honest dialogue within coastal communities about what the future holds, and a strategic approach to deciding how to manage the coast in the future,” Hall said.
Elsewhere, said associate professor Natasha Barlow in the University of Leeds’ School of Earth and Environment, the “speed and amount of future sea level rise” may be “limited” by global warming.
“However, we are already somewhat committed to coastal erosion caused by rising sea levels and prolonged melting of ice sheets as a result of climate change,” she said.
“Therefore, a range of adaptation strategies are needed, which in some cases will require relocating coastal communities as land is lost to the ocean.”
