Millions face long-term coastal flooding risk in UK without climate action, scientists warn
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- Up to 13 million UK residents face long-term coastal flooding risk due to the climate crisis, with a "reasonable worst-case scenario" potentially requiring large-scale population movement away from dramatically reshaped coastlines.
- University of Bristol researchers led by Prof Matt Palmer found that even if current global carbon-cutting pledges are met, an additional 1.4 million people will be exposed to coastal floods by 2200 and 1.7 million by 2300.
- Meeting the Paris Agreement targets would cut the number of people exposed to coastal flooding in 2300 by 1 million, according to the study published in Nature Communications.
- Sea levels have risen around 20cm around the UK in the last century, with another 40–60cm by 2100 already "baked in," putting an additional 500,000 people at risk on top of the 2.5 million already in danger — Lincolnshire and the Humber estuary are most exposed.
- Ice sheet collapse could trigger 15 metres of sea level rise by 2300, swamping large parts of London and many other areas, the researchers warned.
- Dr Rob Larter of the British Antarctic Survey called the analysis "sobering" and said high-impact scenarios "need to be considered as genuine possibilities rather than unlikely scare stories."
- The study did not factor in storm surges supercharged by global heating, future population changes, or future flood defence upgrades — meaning its exposure figures may understate the true risk.
Why it matters: Planners working only on a 2100 horizon may badly underestimate the UK coastal flooding threat — Prof Matt Palmer's team says sea level rise is the "sleeping giant" of climate change, locked in for centuries. The research quantifies that meeting Paris targets would spare 1 million people exposure by 2300, while a high-end 15-metre rise would force managed retreat and massive flood-defence upgrades that Dr Joanne Williams called "extremely challenging."
