The effects of climate change have tragically returned to the headlines with the awful news that over 200 people have died in Spain as a result of torrential rainfall which brought flash flooding to south eastern parts of the country, making roads impassable, bringing down trees and cutting power supplies.
In the town of Chiva, a tourist hot spot near to Valencia over a year’s normal rainfall fell in just eight hours. This equates to an incredible 400 litres of rainfall per square metre!
The devastating weather system (known as gota fria or ‘cold drop’) has produced the country’s worst natural disaster in over 30 years. The final toll is likely to be on another scale altogether with families and officials warning that dozens of people are still missing and unaccounted for.
Our infrastructure is not designed to deal with these levels of flooding
Patrick Mooney News editor, Housing Management & Maintenance
Back home
The terrible events unfolding in Spain also diverted a lot of our attention away from events in Westminster and Labour’s first budget in 14 years.
While our politicians bickered over the levels of Government debt, the previous administration’s fiscal legacy and what the consequences of Rachel Reeves’s decisions will be – I couldn’t help wondering whether nature’s warnings over climate change are delivering the necessary changes in our behaviours and lifestyles.
If the events in south east Spain do not lead to fundamental changes and hasten our efforts to achieve net zero carbon emissions, then what will it take?
Intense rainfall
Back in Spain it appears the intense rain was caused by cold air moving over the warm waters of the Mediterranean, which forced warm, saturated air to rise rapidly until it reached a height at which point moisture had to be released, leading to thunderstorms and levels of rain normally associated with tropical monsoons.
Worryingly further bouts of heavy rainfall are expected across Spain in early November, with fears there will be many more deaths, widespread disruption and extensive damage to infrastructure, as other parts of the country are being affected by the storms.
People are understandably shocked, but how many of us remember that it was only in September that deadly floods struck central Europe (from Austria to Romania), west Africa and southeast Asia?
In a calm and understated way Leslie Mabon, senior lecturer in environmental systems at The Open University, reflected: “The floods are a timely reminder that no country is exempt from the risks of climate change.” She added that extreme weather “can overwhelm the ability of existing defences and contingency plans to cope, even in a relatively wealthy country like Spain”.
Scientists continue to warn us that extreme weather events are becoming more intense, lasting longer and occurring more frequently as a result of human-induced climate change.
A massive wake-up call
Of course, these bouts of extreme weather are not just restricted to record levels of rainfall. We are also seeing hotter and drier spells, as well as an overall warming of the oceans, which in turn is disrupting the traditional patterns of sea currents and prevailing winds.
The events “are yet another wake-up call that our climate is changing rapidly”, according to Hayley Fowler, Professor of Climate Change Impacts at Newcastle University.
“Our infrastructure is not designed to deal with these levels of flooding,” she added, saying “record-shatteringly hot” warmer sea temperatures fuel storms that dump extreme levels of rain in one place.
By a terrible coincidence of timing, the tragedy in Spain has come hot on the heels of news that record levels of heat related deaths have been recorded in many countries in the past two years.
Heat-related deaths rocket
The damage that climate change is doing to southern Europe is perhaps the most startling in heat death figures. Researchers from the Barcelona Institute for Global Health have found that climate breakdown was behind more than half of the 68,000 heat deaths during the scorching European summer of 2022.
The heat-related death toll – which was about 10 times greater than the number of people murdered in Europe that year – was largest in Greece, Italy, Spain and Portugal.
Meanwhile across the globe heat related deaths among the over-65s rocketed by 167% in 2023, compared with the 1990s. Without the climate crisis, an ageing global population means such deaths would have increased, but only by 65%.
High temperatures also led to a record 6% more hours of lost sleep in 2023 than the 1986–2005 average. This is important because poor sleep has a profoundly negative effect on our physical and mental health.
Hotter and drier weather also saw greater numbers of sand and dust storms, which contributed to a 31% increase in the number of people exposed to dangerously high particulate matter concentrations, while life-threatening diseases such as dengue, malaria and West Nile virus continue to spread into new areas.
Closer to home
In the UK it is becoming more apparent that the public are seeing a direct link or association between man-made actions and extreme weather events.
Sadly this growing awareness or acceptance is not translating into more pro-environmental behaviours such as saving electricity, turning down the thermostat at home, buying sustainable products or switching to more sustainable modes of transport or heating.
The reason for the public’s hesitance to change behaviours contributing to long-term climate change mitigation remains unclear. This is where we need more leadership from our political leaders, which could see events like the budget used to promote green activities and behaviours and penalising those which foster our old fossil fuel consumption habit.
In addition, our drains and sewers could do with significant upgrading and investment in, along with a capacity to build and deliver air conditioning units to keep us cool at home.
The COP Summit
In less than two weeks’ time, diplomats, scientists and environmentalists will be meeting for the UN COP29 climate summit in Azerbaijan. It may sound too cynical but these events are very good at getting world leaders to make promises, while domestically changing very little.
António Guterres, the United Nations secretary general, said: “Record-high emissions are posing record-breaking threats to our health. We must cure the sickness of climate inaction – by slashing emissions, protecting people from climate extremes, and ending our fossil fuel addiction – to create a fairer, safer and healthier future for all.”
Temperate countries like ours are also seeing the effects of the climate crisis. In the period 2013 to 2022, the UK’s overall mean increase in heat-related deaths was estimated at nine deaths per 100,000 inhabitants, while there were 8.5 million potential working hours lost due to heat exposure in 2023.
A domestic challenge
Dr Lea Berrang Ford, head of the Centre for Climate and Health Security at the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA), which published its own report on the health impacts of global heating on the UK, said: “Climate change is not solely a future health threat. Health impacts are already being felt domestically and globally, and these risks will accelerate.”
Its forecasts were frightening. Left unchecked the climate crisis could cause up to 10,000 extra deaths in the UK every year by the 2050s as a result of extreme heat and it could also bring in a host of tropical diseases.
The worst-case scenario, published in a damning document by UKHSA, would see average temperatures rise by 4.3C, bringing an estimated twelvefold rise in heat-related deaths by 2070. It adds that deaths could increase by one-and-a-half times in the 2030s.
We cannot say we have not been warned. We need to pay heed to what is happening now in Spain and other parts of the globe AND take action, bringing forward tougher targets over climate change and safeguarding ourselves.
Patrick Mooney is News editor, Housing Management & Maintenance
