Telegraph
The evidence also suggests that rainfall in
Cumbria last weekend only marginally overtook much older records, if at
all. Indeed, the frequency of such floods in the past three decades,
according to scientists from Lancaster University, is not unusual and
has fallen markedly from the mid-20th century.
My point is that this dreadful flooding could easily have happened even
if the climate were not changing, since it is largely caused by
landscape changes. And the measures the world has taken against climate
change have not and will not significantly change the risk of flooding
in Cumbria.
So what, then, have these 21 years of exchanging hot
air on the subject actually achieved? Very little in terms of
restricting global emissions – just look at India and China – but as far
as Britain is concerned, they have had a devastating effect on our
energy policy. Back in 2011, the world pledged to produce binding legal
targets on emissions for all countries at this Paris meeting. But that
ambition has been abandoned in favour of vague “intended” national
promises. Each country must now set its own energy policy. So China and
India – in fact any country – can continue to burn fossil fuels at will.
Apart from Britain. We are left uniquely isolated and
vulnerable as the only country in the world with a legal target for
reducing emissions, thanks to our Climate Change Act of 2008. No other
country will be breaking its own law if it misses its target. But we
have a binding target to reduce emissions by 80 per cent by 2050. We
have repeatedly boasted that we are setting the world an example – but
the world seems disinclined to take notice."
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