{"id":409855,"date":"2025-10-23T13:51:23","date_gmt":"2025-10-23T12:51:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=409855"},"modified":"2025-12-29T01:15:34","modified_gmt":"2025-12-29T00:15:34","slug":"pursuing-net-zero-makes-the-uk-vulnerable-to-bad-weather-bbc-not-climate-change","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=409855","title":{"rendered":"Pursuing Net Zero Makes the UK Vulnerable to Bad Weather, BBC, Not Climate Change"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"The<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From ClimateRealism<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Linnea Lueken<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"A<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

A recent article at the BBC, \u201cGovernment told to prepare for 2C warming by 2050<\/a>,\u201d claims that the United Kingdom needs to prepare for increasing extreme weather as the planet approaches 2\u00b0C warming. This is false in its framing. Although it\u2019s always a good idea to harden infrastructure against weather, the UK is not suffering more extreme weather due to human emissions of carbon dioxide, and the recommendation of attempting to prevent temperature rise is not going to help anyone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The BBC\u2019s post discusses a letter written by the UK government\u2019s \u201cClimate Change Committee\u201d (CCC), which the BBC reports said, \u201c[t]he country was \u2018not yet adapted\u2019 to worsening weather extremes already occurring at current levels of warming, \u2018let alone\u2019 what was expected to come.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The CCC asked the government to \u201cset out a framework of clear long-term objectives\u201d to prevent further temperature rise, with new targets every five years and departments \u201cclearly accountable\u201d for delivering those goals. It warned that \u201ca global warming level of 2C would have significant impact on the UK\u2019s weather, with extreme events becoming more frequent and widespread.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These include increases in heatwaves, droughts, floods, and longer wildfire seasons.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These claims are fearmongering, and no amount of deindustrialization \u2013 which is what\u2019s implied by the \u201cobjectives to prevent further temperature rise\u201d\u2014will stop bad weather from happening, nor will it have any measurable impact on global average temperature.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The simple fact is that the UK contributes a very small amount of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere, which would in theory contribute an even smaller amount to warming. According to emissions data<\/a>, the global share of all UK carbon dioxide emissions is 0.88 percent. Not even 1 percent. Eliminating UK emissions would do absolutely nothing to slow or stop any amount of warming that could be connected to human emissions, if they are, in fact, driving temperature changes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On top of that, data do not show that weather is becoming more extreme in the UK.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The BBC claims that global warming will increase the wildfire season in the UK, and presumably they believe it must have already done so during the past 150 years of planetary warming. A longer wildfire season should result in more fires. Available data, however, does not show that wildfires are getting more frequent or more intense in the UK. Satellite data from Copernicus<\/a> show no trend at all.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"A
Chart of United Kingdom yearly burned area and number of fires from Copernicus.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

For another example, looking at Central England as this<\/a> Climate Realism<\/em> post did, the number of days per year breaching 25\u00b0C (77\u00b0F) show no rising trend, nor does the measured highest daily maximum.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Long term historical data for Europe show that drought is likewise<\/a> not worse today than it was during the Renaissance, long before industrialization.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What is really notable is that Europe alone has actually already warmed 2\u00b0C since about 1820, according to historic European temperature averages<\/a>, but no catastrophic change in weather has occurred. (See figure below)<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"A
Berkeley Earth average European temperature showing a 2.0\u00b0C rise since about 1820. Source: http:\/\/berkeleyearth.lbl.gov\/regions\/europe<\/a> Annotated by Anthony Watts<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Weather isn\u2019t getting worse, but bad weather does still happen. The UK\u2019s largest industrial solar facility, for example, blighting the landscape of Anglesey, North Wales, was recently destroyed<\/a> by a bad storm. That should be enough to give government agencies pause when it comes to at least some net-zero policies, but the real point is that hardening infrastructure against weather should be a priority regardless of climate change. Bad weather will occur, and it will wreck fragile facilities, including solar complexes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hardening against weather extremes, which always have and always will exist, is just common sense. As technology develops and new ways of protecting against bad weather are discovered (like the invention of air conditioning) they should be implemented where they can be, as they can be. Achieving net zero \u2013 especially for a county that emits negligible amounts of greenhouse gases anyway\u2014will not save the UK from bad weather events.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As a news organization, the BBC should not carry water for its government or government advisory boards that want to continue wasting money on futile \u201cobjectives to prevent further temperature rise\u201d when direct efforts to improve infrastructure and harden it against weather extremes, which have happened throughout history, would be far more effective in saving lives and reducing harm.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A recent article at the BBC, \u201cGovernment told to prepare for 2C warming by 2050,\u201d claims that the United Kingdom needs to prepare for increasing extreme weather as the planet approaches 2\u00b0C warming. This is false in its framing. Although it\u2019s always a good idea to harden infrastructure against weather, the UK is not suffering more extreme weather due to human emissions of carbon dioxide, and the recommendation of attempting to prevent temperature rise is not going to help anyone.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":121246920,"featured_media":409863,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","_crdt_document":"","advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[691818389,691818056,691823159,691819743,691819331,691818514,691818087,691818154,691827996],"class_list":{"0":"post-409855","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","6":"hentry","7":"category-uncategorized","8":"tag-bbc","9":"tag-climate-change","10":"tag-climate-change-committee-ccc","11":"tag-climate-propaganda","12":"tag-deindustrialization","13":"tag-extreme-weather","14":"tag-global-warming","15":"tag-net-zero","16":"tag-united-kingdom","18":"fallback-thumbnail"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/0AQMMPx7KADtyyihbgi3f8F64yPNuYAs7pWtyXuZQtmZNazFpLW7uK5cx_-Nj3iClrnlLnFFhhvWze1KZ3tq38_5ABc-PHWH9Mk8e1Ttvq5APBvo5nSjyhtcHNBQEUvw-1.jpeg?fit=1460%2C927&ssl=1","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/paxLW1-1ICz","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":408578,"url":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=408578","url_meta":{"origin":409855,"position":0},"title":"Shut 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