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August 2008
The London climate change adaptation strategy
Summary draft report
The London Climate Change Adaptation Strategy
Summary draft report
August 2008
Greater London Authority
August 2008
Published by
Greater London Authority
City Hall
The Queen’s Walk
More London
London SE1 2AA
www.london.gov.uk
enquiries 020 7983 4100
minicom 020 7983 4458
ISBN 978 1 84781 187 5
Photographs: front cover and pages
7, 13, 21, 23 and 28 © Alamy Images.
Pages 2 and 16 © Shutterstock.
Page 8 © visitlondon/britainonview.
Pages 9, 13 and 25 © Getty Images.
Page 14 © Thames Water.
Page 18 © Jim Smith.
Page 24 © Belinda Lawley.
Page 26 © Tubelines.
Page 31 © Andrew Tucker.
Copies of this report are available
from www.london.gov.uk
Printed on 9Lives 80 paper:
80 per cent recovered fibre and
20 per cent virgin TCF fibre sourced
from sustainable forests; FSC and
NAPM certified.
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Foreword
Our climate is changing. This strategy
starts the process of planning in detail
for how our great city must adapt
to these changes. If we don’t make
the necessary changes then many
Londoners’ quality of life will gradually
deteriorate, we may fail to capitalise
on some of the benefits that the
changing climate will bring and we
will be poorly prepared for the more
extreme and damaging weather that
science says we must expect in future.
Even if all global greenhouse gas
emissions could be stopped today,
the immense inertia in Earth’s
climate systems means that changes
to our climate for the rest of this
century are unavoidable. Preparing
for these inevitable changes is
not an alternative to reducing our
greenhouse gas emissions, but a
parallel and complementary action.
International efforts to reduce global
emissions are not so far making
the drastic reductions required, so
we may be heading for further and
potentially more profound changes to
our climate.
For London, scientists currently
forecast warmer, wetter winters
and hotter drier summers, coupled
with an increase in the fre