WATERWORLD
Waterworld A
FEW WEEKS INTO 2014, and the year will surely be remembered for one thing: sandbags – specifically the incongruous sight of Ghurkhas delivering sandbags to
the stricken residents of Staines. As flooding blighted parts of Britain, with
spectacular rises in groundwater levels, the UK faced a major rethink of how it deals with floodwaters – from tougher planning protections in flood-prone areas, to improving the water-holding capacity of land. There’s the broader picture too: the recent
floodwaters will accentuate the significance of Climate Week, which is intended to focus minds on how we prevent climate change. The Met Office’s chief scientist Dame Julia Slingo says “all the evidence” points to climate change as a key reason for storms raging across Britain. So we must learn to deal with extreme weather events while trying to mitigate – and minimise – climate change to protect ourselves and our environment. ESRC-funded academics have been looking
into these issues to shed light on areas as diverse as our response to extreme weather, from flooding to drought, to how we use resources like water. It’s as a result of this type of research that, after the worst rainfall in 250 years, Prime Minister David Cameron hinted at major changes to transport networks, housing and infrastructure. Take building on flood plains, for example.
As floodwaters rampaged through built-up areas, much criticism was directed at those who bought
Recent record rainfall and flooding across the UK have raised questions about how we manage our environment, deal with flooding and build a resilient infrastructure. But also whether the effects of weather influence our opinions of climate change. By Sarah Womack
or built houses on flood plains. In turn, residents blamed a decision to stop dredging rivers. Professor Nick Pidgeon is an ESRC Climate
Leader Professorial Fellow. He’s also Professor of Environmental Psychology and Director of the Understanding Risk Research Group at Cardiff University, and is researching public responses to, among other things, climate change risks. He says: “We know from our ESRC research
(Perceptions of Climate Change, which involved a survey of 1,800 participants) that people who experience flooding are more concerned about climate change, and that climate change and flooding are related in people’s minds, so you
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Below: The road to Muchelney in Somerset became a symbol of the severity and duration of the Winter flooding Opposite: The trade- off may be securing areas against flooding, while diverting water to pasture land
Nowadays rivers don’t offer
much economically apart from aesthetics and tourism
would expect these events to raise concern about climate change in general.” His 2011 research concluded: “Severe environmental changes and events, such as flooding, present significant opportunities to engage people with climate change, and encourage action.” Professor Pidgeon says there will now need
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to be much tighter restrictions on where we build, and we will need to pay more for flood defences – something the public may well accept. “We’re going to have to build more resilient flood management systems in more locations, move railways... many of these are quite long-term infrastructure investments. “There will also probably need to be much
stricter building controls. The building industry and others may want to lobby against it, so there will be a political debate, but it is also a regulatory issue, and if you are building on a flood plain you need to build houses with greater levels of flood protection.” His comments come amid a reported 30 per cent increase in applications to build in locations designated as high flood risk by the Environment Agency. Professor Pidgeon, who is also a member of the UK Department for Energy and Climate Change’s Science Advisory Group, added: “Our work for the UK Energy Research Centre shows people fully understand that money has to be paid on infrastructure, whether it’s different ways of producing power or strengthening defences against climate change. They realise this will have
10 SOCIETY NOW SPRING 2014
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