The British Met Office said on Thursday that sea levels around the UK are rising at an accelerating rate as a result of climate change, making British coasts more vulnerable.
Since the 20th century, the sea level in the UK has risen by 16.5 cm, and the annual rate of rise has doubled in a century: from 1.5 mm to 3-5.3 mm. According to the agency, the higher the sea level, the more damage storms can cause. Among other things, the rise can be attributed to the melting of the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets and glaciers.
Being an island country, the UK is particularly vulnerable to coastal erosion. According to a recent report by the British Environment Agency, one in six people in the country is at risk of flooding due to rain or sea level rise, and one million people will be directly affected by sea level rise by the end of the century.
According to the report, recent decades in the UK have been much warmer, wetter, and much brighter than the 20th century. The climate of the British Isles is warming slightly faster than the global average, and the past decade has been one degree Celsius warmer than the period between 1961 and 1990.
