Climate Change and the UK Storms

Current storm hitting the UK and Ireland

The ongoing weather we have been having here in UK has brought to the fore again the issue of climate change. As to whether what we have been experiencing is in partly down to an ongoing process of climate change. From just after Christmas we have been hit by storm after storm, we have been at the end of an Atlantic conveyor belt of wind and rain it seems with one storm hitting us and then another and another and another. I have lost count as to how many we have had, but it seems rather more like one long continuous storm than an endless series to me. The storms have brought high winds and turned places like Somerset in to giant lakes, this time last year we where under inches and inches of snow. As I write a relatively mild storm is passing over head, so far in my part of the UK this one has been more an inconvenience rather than a problem.  But the Met Office video below shows four storms hitting the UK and Ireland in February alone.



The UK Met Office in the last week attributed the storms in part to climate change, these storms are extraordinary in their frequency and it is this rather than their ferocity that has caused most of the problems. I myself believe that climate change is real, both as a naturally occurring event and also heightened by human activity. The planet its infinitely complex and something we do not fully understand as yet but it seems absolutely crazy to me that some people would at this point conclusively say man made climate change is a myth. From the weather records over its recorded history we can see the changes and from other sources like tree rings or Ice core samples we can see how our planet has changed over millennia. And the majority of scientist in this field feel that man made climate change is a reality. With this evidence in mind we certainly should be as a global community working harder to do something about the changes we are making as a species. I have to say as far as the argument between climate camps goes I am rather of one opinion whether man made climate change is true or not! By this I mean we have to change the way we do things anyway! Most of our energy reserves are finite and now coming to the end of their reserves, we need alternatives and climate change real or not can help instigate those changes. Living in a greener world is a win win situation, if we are impacting our environment as the evidence suggests then being greener will reduce the impact of climate change in the long run. Placing a wager on whether climate change is real or not seems like a fools game to me and by denouncing it or continuing to do as we do is making that bet!

As for the storms here in the UK, fingers crossed that it will soon be over as I am so very tired of repairing my greenhouse. Luckily this is only my little problem and I am not enduring the scale of wind, rain and floods that other parts of the UK are.