2003 heatwave will be summer norm - expert

The heatwave in Europe in 2003 which killed 25,000 people will represent a normal summer by 2050, a seminar on climate change in Dublin heard yesterday.

Scientists, including Irish Times columnist Brendan McWilliam, told the conference that Ireland was locked into weather patterns causing summertime water shortages on the east coast, changes in agriculture production, more intense storms, flooding and health risks from tropical diseases.

Rises of a half-metre in sea levels will require flood protection measures similar to those in place to protect London.

The rises would also have huge implications for flood protection work in Waterford, Cork, Limerick and Galway and many rural areas.

Prof Andrew Watkinson, of the University of East Anglia in the UK, is an expert on climate change. He said there was nothing we could now do to avert disruptive weather patterns over the next 50 years.

However he warned against despondency as inaction would create "catastrophic results" in the following 50 years.

Opening the seminar on behalf of Sustainable Energy Ireland, the organisation's managing director, David Taylor, said most scientists around the world now agreed that fossil fuels, which provide the bulk of energy supplies, released carbon-dioxide (CO2) and were bad for global warming.

He added that even in the US, where President Bush has been sceptical of climate change, global warming was now being accepted more widely.

Republican governor of California Arnold Schwarzenegger had "completely bought in" to the idea, and was actively seeking measures to adapt to the coming climate change.

Prof Watkinson told the conference that marine algae which were confined to the Bay of Biscay in the 1950s were now to be found around the Irish coast because of global warming.

With temperatures rising, the heatwave which struck Europe in 2003, and which was responsible for the deaths of 25,000 people, "will be just a normal summer in 2050".

He said by 2080 there would be no Arctic ice in summer.

Cities like London were under serious threat as sea water rises, and plans were already afoot to replace the Thames Barrier which prevents flooding in London.

He said there would also be health risks from malaria-bearing mosquitos, and an increase in the intensity and frequency of storms. "Environmental refugees" would become a familiar phrase as people fled from more extreme weather.

"We have got to look at stripping carbon out of the atmosphere and capturing it in the ground, and that involves looking at the carbon intensity of our energy consumption."

Mr McWilliams told the conference that for Ireland climate change over the next 50 years would mean an increase in sea levels of half a metres. This would have severe implications for flooding.

Winters would be wetter and warmer, while on the east coast there would be droughts in summertime. Average summer temperatures in the south would be 21 to 23 degrees.

There would also be changes in agriculture, with maize replacing grass as cattle fodder and cattle spending less time in winter sheds. Cattle and sheep would cause more damage to wet ground with their hooves.