Global warming pushing flood damage costs up in Britain

AFP ^ | Apr 22, 2004

[presidio9]

Britain's annual bill for flood damage could increase 20-fold this century unless steps are taken to combat the global warming which is causing it, a report by the government's chief scientist said Thursday. The report, written by David King, head of the Office of Science and Technology for the Ministry of Trade and Industry, forecast that the cost of flood damage would rise from one billion pounds (1.49 billion euros, 1.77 billion dollars) a year to 21 billion pounds by 2080.

It said the probability of floods along British rivers and coasts could be between two and 20 times higher and that flooding due to rain could be up to six times higher.

The number of people living in areas at risk from flooding is likely to rise from 1.6 million today to between 2.3 and 3.6 millions by 2080.

King told BBC radio that investments in projects to tackle flooding "will need to be increased over the next 20 years from something like 500 million per annum today to up to close to one billion per annum".

[Piquaboy]

Any fool knows that it is all the fault of President Bush.

[catpuppy]

More silliness from "the sky is falling" crowd.

[Always Right]

Hey wait a minute, I thought the latest global warming was going to cause the next ice age. Oh well, whatever scares them the most.

[Brett66]

I'm afraid global warming on Jupiter is probably Bush's fault too:

Expert Predicts Global Climate Change On Jupiter As It's Spots Disappear

[Blood of Tyrants]

Courtney Love says that her drug addiction and her flopped album are Bush's fault. Really!

[traumer]

B U S H !!

[foghornleghorn]

And guess what agency of the government is going to get the research grants and contracts to spend all that money.

[SpottedBeaver]

Just love the way AFP writes this.

They state it as fact in the headline; then the very first sentence it becomes pure speculation.

[Einigkeit_Recht_Freiheit]

Actually you seem to be a bit behind on the head in the sand climate change denial group.

There appears to pretty much be a consensus that the climate is changing. Oil and coal companies along with the "don't worry about the ozone hole just wear sunblock and hat crowd have altered their rhetoric to say that it is part of the natural fluctuations in the Earth's climate.
(All of the big Re-Insurance companies are factoring it into their policies)

Human activitiy apparently has nothing to do with it despite the fact that we dump billions of tons of CO2 into the atmosphere each year and have an increase in molecules CO2 per million of 33% in the last 40 years that has remarkably coincided with the massive increase in the burining of fossil fuels.

Summary: Deny that humans are invovled.
Keep repeating to self "if it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it is not a duck".

[upcountryhorseman]

You can't stop Mother Nature! Can you stop volcanic eruptions? Can you stop gaseous propulsions from the sun?

[Mike Darancette]

From could to would to will in one article, remarkable

[Mark17]

There appears to pretty much be a consensus that the climate is changing.

There are many scientists who do not agree with that at all. 30 some years ago, these same people were claiming we were heading for a new ice age. Don't listen to them. Rush is right when he says radical evironmentalism, is the newest home of communism, a movement bent on destroying the economies of the west. The thing that causes global warming is that big burning orb in the sky, called the sonne.

[presidio9]

I can't even stop gaseous propulsions from this large body.

[dufekin]

Yes, it is President Bush's fault that he did not prevail upon Tony Blair to pass a law through Parliament requiring the removal of all property of any economic value whatsoever, both private and public, from any potential flood area. President Bush also failed to personally review the engineering of the storm-drainage systems in every British city to ensure adequate capacity, and to make a personal guarantee of his work, and to provide for the maintenance of the systems. He moreover failed to design, install, guarantee, and maintain appropriate technologies for the adequate drainage of every basement in all of Great Britain.

Not that I expect that of an American President, but you apparently do.

[AFPhys]

The most prominent (by far) molecule with the potential to cause warming in the atmosphere is not CO2, it is H2O. No matter what you "feel", CO2 is simply not that important. That is why the temperature of the atmosphere has not responded in any predictable manner to the burning of fossil fuels. That is why the satellite temperature data are completely at odds with the global warming crowd. That is why true scientists who study real data are at odds with the GCM constructors and manipulators.

There is simply no rational reason to implement a draconian strategy to reduce CO2 which would in any event shave less than 0.3C off the temperature of the globe.

When you are able to explain using your wonderful CO2 model why the temperatures today are 2-3C cooler than in the 800-1100AD time period, perhaps we'll talk. Until then,...

You may be comfortable being Chicken Little, hiding your mind to the facts, and "ducking" all the time, but I prefer real science.