- 1London School of Economics, Grantham Research Institute, London, United Kingdom of Great Britain – England, Scotland, Wales (d.a.stainforth@lse.ac.uk)
- 2McCourt School of Public Policy, Georgetown University, Washington DC, USA. (rac121@georgetown.edu)
- 3Department of Physics, University of Warwick, Coventry, UK
If there is to be sustained, large-scale action to tackle climate change, there will have to be sustained, long-term, buy-in for that action from populations and electorates. This requires the link to be clearly made between global change (e.g. the target to limit global warming to less than 2oC above pre-industrial levels) and local impacts as they may be felt by individuals. In the media this link is often made via the consequences of extreme events such as floods, wildfires, and droughts; stark images of such events in the media are a significant part of the public narrative around climate change. Nevertheless, devastating though such events may be, it is easy, and perhaps reasonable, to believe that you as an individual might not be affected; you might well not get hit by a flood or a wildfire; you might “get lucky”. With many other political and social issues facing electorates it is perhaps not surprising therefore that action on climate is rarely voters’ top priority1.
However, this framing of the threats of climate change in terms of the risks of direct impacts, misses the essence of the relationship between physical climate change and society. In a recent paper2, Calel and Stainforth argue that changing physical risk profiles are likely to strain the underlying fabric of our societies in many ways. For instance, whether or not you are directly affected by climate extremes or other climate change impacts, the consequences of such events represent a drain on our economies which will necessarily lead to higher taxes and/or the reduction of funds for other priorities such as education, health care, infrastructure etc. The consequences will thus be felt across our societies, even by those not hit by floods or wildfires.
Calel and Stainforth call for more effort to be invested in bringing together expertise across the social and physical sciences to paint better pictures of the complex consequences of changing disaster risks for the whole of society. This in turn would enable more broadly relevant representations of climate change in the media and in public and political discourse. Given the complexity of the system and the deep uncertainties inherent in climate predictions3, storyline approaches4 will be a key tool for these trans-disciplinary approaches and for subsequent communication and engagement with decision makers.
These arguments will be presented and elaborated upon in this presentation.
References:
1 See, for instance, https://yougov.co.uk/topics/society/trackers/the-most-important-issues-facing-the-country for a survey of the most important issues facing the UK.
2 Calel, R., Stainforth, D.A. Little floods everywhere: what will climate change mean for you?. Climatic Change 178, 1 (2025). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10584-024-03819-x
3 Stainforth, D., “Predicting Our Climate Future: What we know, what we don’t know and what we can’t know”, Oxford University Press, 2023.
4 Shepherd, T.G., Boyd, E., Calel, R.A. et al. Storylines: an alternative approach to representing uncertainty in physical aspects of climate change. Climatic Change 151, 555–571 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10584-018-2317-9
How to cite: Stainforth, D. and Calel, R.: The societal consequences of “little” floods everywhere, EGU General Assembly 2025, Vienna, Austria, 27 Apr–2 May 2025, EGU25-12223, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu25-12223, 2025.
