Britain’s coastal communities may have to be relocated because of rising sea levels and the increased risk of flooding due to climate change, the chair of the Environment Agency has warned. Emma Howard Boyd said that the UK “cannot win a war against water” by building higher land defences and that at least £1bn a year needed to be allocated to coastal protections over the course of the next 50 years. Setting out the agency’s draft long-term strategy for tackling flooding, she said the world could heat up by as much as 4C by 2100, based on current trends and called on the government to help create “climate resilient” communities and to “act now without delay”.
In October, the Committee on Climate Change warned in a report that rising sea levels would put 1.5m UK properties at risk of coastal flooding while those threatened by coastal erosion would rise almost 15 times by 2085 compared with today. The report found that it would be uneconomical to protect about 1,600km of coast – or 29 percent – of the English coastline if sea levels rose by the one meter expected by the end of this century. “The coastline has never stayed in the same place and there have always been floods, but climate change is increasing and accelerating these threats,” Ms Howard Boyd said .
“We can’t win a war against water by building away climate change with infinitely high flood defences. We need to develop consistent standards for flood and coastal resilience in England that help communities better understand their risk and give them more control about how to adapt and respond.” Brit ain must be candid on the scale of its climate challenge. “In some places, the scale of the threat may be so significant that recovery will not always be the best long-term solution”, she said. “In these instances, we will help communities to move out of harm’s way.” “Despite our collective best efforts, we will not always be able to prevent flooding and coastal change happening.”