CCC launches Call for Evidence on UK risks and opportunities from climate change

Every five years, the UK Government must carry out an assessment of current and future risks to the country from climate change. To inform the 2022 risk assessment, the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) has asked the Committee on Climate Change to prepare an independent ‘Evidence Report’ by 2021.The Committee published a similar evidence report in 2016, which went on to inform the UK Government’s second Climate Change Risk Assessment in 2017.A consortium led by the University of Exeter has been contracted by the CCC to prepare the analysis and draft the technical chapters for the Evidence Report. The Call for Evidence is available on the University of Exeter website.The following general issues are of particular interest: How risks or opportunities may have changed in the light of improved methods of assessment and new knowledge since the completion of the analysis for the previous CCRA in 2015. The quantified effects of current and planned adaptation policies and other adaptation action in the overall assessment of risk.  What the net effect of different risks acting together could be, either due to concurrent timing, acting on the same location or the same receptor. How climate change interacts with socio-economic factors to affect the level of risk or opportunity. Quantitative assessments of the benefits of adaptation action. Identification of any key thresholds in risks or adaptation. Identification of the potential for lock-in of particular adaptation measures or lack of them, i.e. decisions made now that commit to long-term consequence or courses of action. Quantitative assessment of the uncertainties, limitations and confidence in the underlying evidence and analysis for different risks and adaptation measures.Please note that evidence should be in the form of academic papers in relevant fields or official reports from government, private sector or civil society organisations with responsibility for any aspect of adaptation to climate change. The closing date for submissions is Friday 10th May.