The changes in the UK's climate over the past two decades are "unprecedented" in the historical record and are normalising extreme weather events that would have been considered exceptional a generation ago, according to the Met Office's most comprehensive assessment of how global heating is reshaping Britain's weather.
The State of the UK Climate report, an annual publication that draws on data from across the meteorological network, concludes that the period since 2000 has been warmer, wetter and sunnier than any comparable period in the record. The average temperature over the past decade was approximately 0.8°C warmer than the 1961-1990 average, and the ten warmest years in the UK record have all occurred since 2002.
The most striking finding is not any single record but the accumulation of extremes. The report documents an increase in the frequency of heatwaves, heavy rainfall events and coastal flooding that is consistent with the predictions of climate models and that is accelerating. The number of days when maximum temperatures exceed 28°C, a threshold at which mortality rates begin to rise measurably, has more than doubled since the 1960s.
The report is careful to distinguish between natural variability and the signal of climate change, but its conclusions are unambiguous. The changes observed in the UK's climate over the past two decades are outside the range of natural variability and are consistent with the warming expected from greenhouse gas emissions. The climate that Britain experienced in the 20th century, the report concludes, has now been definitively lost.
The implications for policy are significant. The report argues that adaptation to a changed climate must now be treated as a national priority, alongside the effort to reduce emissions. It calls for mandatory standards for overheating in new homes, a national programme of flood resilience and a fundamental reassessment of how the country manages water resources.
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