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Following today’s publication of the Government’s latest projections for UK climate change, Natural England has highlighted the urgent need to enable the natural environment to adapt to the major changes now being forecast.

Helen Phillips, Natural England’s Chief Executive said: “The latest government forecasts should serve as a wake-up call - we are looking at a life-changing alteration in our climate that has no parallel in recent human history. Protecting the natural environment is essential if society is to successfully adapt to these changes. We have to go much further in enabling the environment to adapt if it is to continue to provide the range of services that we often take for granted, but which are fundamental to our society, our wildlife and the health of our countryside”.

Under its medium emissions scenario, Defra’s UK Climate Programme is now forecasting average summer increases of up to 4^oC by 2080 for southern England, accompanied by increases of 5.4^oC in peak summer temperatures and a 22% fall in rainfall. Droughts interspersed with periods of intense rainfall are likely to be much more commonplace and flooding will become more frequent. Changes on this scale will present major challenges to our wildlife, farmed environment and wider countryside and much of our familiar wildlife and landscapes may struggle to adapt unless greater focus is put on enabling them to do so.

Helen Phillips continued: “In the face of the challenges presented by climate change we have to allow natural processes within the environment to function. We cannot rely on technology or on building our way out of trouble. The critical services that a healthy environment delivers – like carbon capture, coastal defence, clean water, clean air or healthy, productive soils – must be allowed to operate unimpeded and undamaged to a much greater degree than they have been able to in recent years.”

For example, protection and improvement of the condition of the UK’s peatbogs is now seen as fundamental to reducing carbon emissions. Peatbogs are the most important store of carbon in the UK – storing more than all the forests of Germany and France combined. In the same way, saltmarsh protects hundreds of miles of the British coastline at no cost and the flood control and storm buffering benefits provided by coastal habitats like saltmarsh and sand dunes have been estimated at over £1 billion per year. Urban green spaces help cool surrounding built-up areas by up to 4^oC. Upland rivers can increase the supply of fresh drinking water – vital given the projected decrease in rainfall.

Natural England has already undertaken a series of wide-ranging studies* looking at how different landscapes are likely to change and has started to identify the most appropriate forms of management that will enable wildlife and habitats to adapt and to continue to provide the vital life support services that humans depend on. In areas like the Dorset Downs or Cranborne Chase for example, it may be necessary to begin a program of planting drought tolerant native trees to replace the much-loved beech trees that are likely to be an early casualty of climate change. In the Cumbria High Fells there is an urgent need to improve the condition of existing upland habitats and water resources.

Helen Phillips concluded: “Many will argue that we need to invest more heavily in technology, to build bigger defences and put the health of the environment on the backburner while we cope with climate change. In some instances, we may have no choice if we are to defend highly vulnerable assets and communities, but as the default solution that cannot be the way forward. Put simply, if we do not work with nature and the environment we are doomed to failure in the battle against climate change.”

Notes to Editors

*Natural England’s Character Area reports
Natural England’s Character Area Climate Change Project focuses on four of the 159 ‘Character Areas’ in England. ‘Character Areas’ are areas of English countryside that contain a unique combination of landscape, wildlife, natural and cultural features. Four reports have now been published which will be used to engage local communities, land managers and organisations to find approaches that deliver successful and long term adaptation to climate change. The approach taken with these reports will be extended across England over the next year into five more pilot areas.

The Climate Change Character Area reports published to date focus on four treasured, and very different, English landscapes:

• the high fells of the Lake District;

• the woodland and chalk grassland of the Dorset Downs and Cranborne Chase;

• the varied, farmed landscape of the Shropshire Hills;

• and the low-lying wetlands of the Norfolk Broads.

Key findings from the reports

The Norfolk Broads

Because of its coastal nature and generally flat landscape, the habitats of the Norfolk Broads are particularly susceptible to the impacts of climate change:

• Saline penetration from surrounding sea water will increasingly impact the Broads’ freshwater habitats, making them more brackish and adversely affecting species dependent upon freshwater conditions, such as the bittern, water soldier and many species of fish. Restoring the structure of river channels and adapting dredging depths in rivers would help to moderate saline intrusion, as would raising water levels in the Upper Thurne.

• Natural floodplain wetlands will be impacted by a repeated cycle of flooding and drought which will lead to changes in many habitats and species. Rare water plants may decline due to increased soil erosion affecting water quality. Improving connectivity between river channels, planting of wet woodland, and restoration of water meadows would help floodplains and wetland habitats function more effectively.

• Changes in the timing of seasonal events like flowering, breeding and migration may result in the decline of migratory birds such as turtle dove, yellow wagtail and cuckoo. Altered cropping and grazing patterns and extending existing habitats and creating new habitat areas would all have an impact. New wetland areas may need to be created to moderate the flooding of existing wildlife sites.

Cumbria High Fells

• England’s peat soils store around 300 million tonnes of carbon and, like many upland areas, the Cumbria High Fells are a “carbon time bomb” needing to be specifically managed as a future carbon store. Significant amounts of carbon will be emitted if the drier summers and heavier rain expected from climate change are allowed to dry out or erode peat supplies. Improving the condition of all existing upland habitats and water resources is a priority, particularly high carbon ones like blanket bog.

• Many species in the area are likely to expand their range - the ruddy darter and the hairy dragonfly have been present in Cumbria since 2001 and the heath fritillary butterfly may colonise the area. Garlic mustard and cow parsley will benefit from a warmer environment, although others species will decline, such as the stiff sedge plant, the ice age relic fish the arctic char, and the mountain ringlet butterfly, which faces local extinction.

• More extreme cycles of wetting and drying may also affect the foundations of walls and historic buildings, iconic features of this region.

Shropshire Hills

• The Shropshire Hills contain an important range of habitat and landscape assets, from dry heaths to oak woodland, from moorland to alder-lined rivers and streams. Climate change is expected to change the mix of species and habitats traditionally found in the area, and affect the timing of seasonal events like flowering, breeding and migration.

• Migratory birds such as the pied flycatcher, cuckoo and redstart may struggle to adapt to changes in seasonal timing while species associated with cooler conditions at higher altitudes may suffer. Red grouse and the cowberry plant found at Long Mynd and Stiperstones are at the southern edge of their UK range and could face an uncertain future.

• Salmon, white clawed crayfish (a globally threatened species) and the banded demoiselle damselfly may decline as increased soil erosion affects river quality.

• Tree species not currently native to this area, like sweet chestnut, sycamore and beech, would be better suited to surviving under changed conditions and may need to be planted in increasing numbers.

Dorset Downs and Cranborne Chase

• By 2080 the climate may resemble that of present day Portugal. Beech trees, common in Dorset and a much-loved feature of the landscape, will decline. At the same time chalk stream networks are likely to contract, leading to a decline in freshwater species such as the Atlantic stream crayfish.

• Summer droughts may, however, be accompanied by intense winter rain storms leading to increased soil erosion affecting the natural environment and presenting challenges for famous features like the Iron Age hill forts of Maiden Castle and Hambledon Hill.

• To help the area adapt it will become increasingly important to improve the condition of existing habitats and create new habitat areas. A programme of planting locally native, but drought-tolerant replacements for existing mature trees may well be required.

For further information:

Please contact the National Press Office on 0845 603 9953; press@naturalengland.org.uk; out of hours 07970 098005.

View the information and PDF copies of Natural England’s Character Area reports.

Working with nature: the sustainable solution to tackling climate change