UK Climate Change Risk Assessment
A UK Climate Change Risk Assessment (CCRA) must be published every five years.
The UK Government has published the first assessment of the impacts the UK is facing from climate change. The Climate Change Risk Assessment (CCRA) presents the latest evidence on the threats and opportunities of climate change for the UK to the end of the century. The CCRA consists of a number of reports, including 'a Climate Change Risk Assessment for Scotland'. A summary of the Scotland report is also available.
Under the Climate Change (Scotland) Act, Scottish Ministers are required to develop an adaptation programme to address the risks identified for Scotland in the CCRA and work on this is now underway. In the meantime, the Climate Change Adaptation Framework and the accompanying Sector Action Plans continue to build resilience and capacity to adapt to climate changes in Scotland.
The CCRA
The CCRA draws together evidence and analysis which will enable all UK Administrations to:
- Understand the level of risk[1] (including opportunities as well as threats) posed by climate change.
- Compare the risks posed by a changing climate with other pressures on the Government
- Prioritise adaptation policy
- Assess the costs and benefits of adaptation actions
The Scottish Government is a co-funder of this work and the CCRA has considered risks specific to Scottish spatial areas and sectors. Successive CCRAs will allow us to chart whether Scotland's vulnerability has decreased against previous findings.
Phases of the CCRA
The first phase of the CCRA project started in September 2009 and focused on developing the assessment method.
An initial seminar to increase the awareness of the UKCCRA was held in Edinburgh on 8 March. It brought together a wide range of stakeholders from different sectors and types of organisation across Scotland. The seminar provided an overview of what the risk assessment covers and explained how and when stakeholder organisations might be involved. More information on this event including a report and presentations from the day can be found here.
The second phase, which took place from January to summer 2010, provided sector level analysis for the UK across eleven sectors. This work included sector scoping reports and a number of sectoral workshops. The eleven sectors are as follows:
- Agriculture
- Biodiversity and ecosystem services
- Built environment (including cultural heritage)
- Business/industry/services
- Energy
- Fisheries and marine
- Flooding and coastal erosion
- Forestry
- Health
- Transport
- Water (resources, demand and quality)
During phase three, a further analysis was undertaken for the Devolved Administrations and English regions, including a CCRA for Scotland. As part of this, a workshop was held in Glasgow to give stakeholders an opportunity to discuss which sectors are important for Scotland and which risks they would like to see reflected in the UKCCRA. More information on this event including presentations and a workshop report can be found in our events section.
Following this, Defra, together with the contractor HR Wallingford, reviewed the findings from the various analyses and the outputs have now been refined into a coherent package. The results were also reviewed across UK Government Departments, by the Scottish Government and the other Devolved Administrations, and independently by a series of academic and expert peer-reviewers.
[1] Where risk is a consideration of the likelihood of an impact and the magnitude of the consequences.