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UK challenges: landscapes and climate change

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How should we protect the UK's landscapes, manage flood risk and prepare for a changing climate?

National Parks

The UK has 15 National Parks; the first was the Peak District in 1951.
They aim to conserve natural beauty and wildlife and help people enjoy them, while supporting local communities.
Conflicts arise between conservation and development, for example over quarries, new housing, wind farms and visitor numbers.

Flood risk

Rivers: hard engineering such as flood walls and storage reservoirs, and soft approaches such as tree planting, washlands and flood warnings.
Coasts: Shoreline Management Plans decide whether to hold the line, advance the line, use managed realignment or take no active intervention.
The Thames Barrier (in operation since 1982) protects London from tidal surges.

Climate change in the UK

Future impacts are uncertain because they depend on how much greenhouse gas the world emits and on how the climate system responds.
Likely impacts include hotter, drier summers, wetter winters, more flooding, sea level rise threatening coasts, and changes to farming and wildlife.
Responses: national, such as the Climate Change Act 2008 and the target of net zero by 2050; local, such as council climate plans, flood defences, insulation and tree planting.
Worked example

Explain why the future impacts of climate change on the UK are uncertain.

  1. Nobody knows exactly how much greenhouse gas will be emitted in future.
  2. Scientists use different models and scenarios that give a range of results.
  3. Feedbacks in the climate system, such as ice melt, are hard to predict.

Answer: Uncertain future emissions and complex climate processes give a range of possible outcomes.

Key idea

The UK has 15 National Parks (first: Peak District, 1951) balancing conservation with development. Flood risk is managed with hard and soft methods, Shoreline Management Plans and the Thames Barrier. Climate change impacts are uncertain; responses include national targets (net zero by 2050) and local action.

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