June
2004
Derbyshire - The Day After Tomorrow |
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| Is
our future bright or gloomy? |
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With
the film 'The Day After Tomorrow' currently stirring up a storm of
debate , it seems pertinent to look at the consequences of global
warming for Derbyshire.
BBC weather presenter Sara-Leigh Barnett explains... |
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With the film 'The Day After Tomorrow' currently stirring up a storm
of debate amongst its audiences, it seems pertinent to look at the
consequences of global warming for Derbyshire.
In the words of one meteorologist 'The Day After Tomorrow' was, "quite
entertaining but largely meteorological nonsense.
"It takes one or two real ideas and mixes them with a vast amount
of Hollywood artistic license and produces a jolly yarn."
So what about the real world?
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| Darley
Park: will it get hotter? |
Climate
change is a complex subject.
The
latest thinking is that the world is warming up, but how this will
affect us in the future is hard to qualify and quantify, particularly
on a small scale such as Derbyshire.
It is also now accepted that the human population is adding to and
changing the levels of the gases responsible for the greenhouse effect*
and is therefore enhancing the warming process.
Globally 1988 was the warmest year ever recorded and eight out of
the ten warmest years fell in the last decade.
This has caused global ice sheets and snowfields to melt, and it is
estimated that by the year 2100 the sea level will have risen by an
average of 50cm.
In addition, global temperatures are expected to rise by approximately
3 degrees Celsius.
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These maps indicate that by 2080 Derbyshire could have a 10 - 20%
increase in average annual rainfall, and up to a 3 degrees Celsius
rise in average annual temperature.
The sea level rise is anticipated to flood parts of East Anglia as
well as parts of the south east.
In addition to this, coastal erosion along the Yorkshire and Lincolnshire
coast will locate Derbyshire closer to some parts of the east coast.
These factors will inevitably result in different climatic conditions
for Derbyshire.
Studies
by the Climate Research Unit at the University of East Anglia predict
wetter winters, and hotter dryer summers for our area.
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| Derbyshire
in flood: We may get more of this |
This could
result in floods and storms in winter months, and with demand for
water and evaporation from Derbyshire's reservoirs increasing in hotter
weather, drought conditions in summer months.
If our climate becomes more Mediterranean then we will be able to
grow a wider range of fruits and arable crops and even cultivate our
wine industry in the lowland areas of Derbyshire.
The downside is that cockroaches, bloodsucking ticks, scorpions, poisonous
spiders and malaria carrying mosquitoes will also thrive.
If the seas become warmer, although there is a distinct risk that
they will eventually become cooler as the Gulf Stream alters its course,
then our seas will support mullet, anchovies and even sharks!
Warmer weather will also lead to increased levels of skin cancer and
cataracts.
So what
will Derbyshire be like 'The Day After Tomorrow'?
In the words of Dr Merylyn McKenzie, of the UK Climate Impacts Programme
at Oxford University, "Things may grow better for a while and
there has been a move towards outdoor living with barbeques and café
society, so there will be positive side effects, but it is a complicated
package. Quite a lot of it will be nasty."
Professor Phil Jones, of the Climatic Research Unit, predicts that
whatever climate change occurs in the UK, "We certainly have
the resources to cope with it…", and that, "We are
better off than a lot of people [in other parts of the world]."
*The greenhouse effect is the natural and essential feature of our
atmosphere without which our planet would be too cold to inhabit.
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