Environment Secretary Michael Gove has today sketched out plans for a raft of new climate policies, in response to fresh warnings the UK faces 'devastating impacts' if projected global temperature increases are not curbed over the coming decades.

The government and the Met Office today released the latest set of official UK climate change forecasts - UK Climate Projections 2018 (UKCP18) - hailing the sweeping report as the most comprehensive package of climate projections produced to date.

Released just days after the US government published its latest assessment of climate risks and warned climate change will inflict "substantial damages on US lives", the Met Office report paints a similarly bleak picture, confirming that under the highest emissions scenarios the UK faces sharply increased drought, heat wave, and flood risks, as well as sea level increases of up to 1.15 metres by 2100.

Specifically, the report warns that under a high emission scenario the UK could face summer temperatures that are up to 5.4C hotter by 2070, while winters could be up to 4.2C warmer. At the same time the chance of heatwaves that are as hot as last summer's could reach 50 per cent by 2050, while average summer rainfall could fall by up to 47 per cent by 2070. In contrast, winter precipitation is projected to increase by up to 35 per cent by 2070, leading to increased flood risk.

Even in the low emission scenario, the projections show the UK's average yearly temperature could be up to 2.3C higher by the end of the century, the report warns.

The researchers who worked on the projections said they were designed to help a wide range of stakeholders, from members of the public looking to buy a new house through to businesses, investors, and policymakers, to make informed decisions about future climate risks.

"Climate change will affect everybody," warned Defra Chief Scientific Adviser Ian Boyd. "UKCP18 is designed to help everybody make better decisions, from those buying a house to people making large investments in infrastructure. It has been produced using state-of-the-art methods."

Claire Perry, Minister for Energy and Clean Growth, said the update should act as a wake-up call to politicians and business leaders alike. "These projections from leading UK scientists build on last month's report from climate experts, highlighting the stark reality that we must do more to tackle climate change in order to avoid devastating impacts on our health and prosperity," she said. "We are already leading the world in the fight against climate change but we cannot be complacent. As we look towards crucial global climate talks in Poland next week, it is clear that now, more than ever, is the time for collective and ambitious action to tackle this urgent challenge." 

Speaking at the official launch of the report at the Science Museum this morning, Gove gave his most detailed speech to date on climate change and promised the government would respond to the growing risks the UK faces with a host of new policies.

In a thinly veiled rebuke to those Brexit-campaigning colleagues who insist - in defiance of every scientific academy on the planet - that climate risks have been overblown, Gove stressed that government policy had to be led by scientific warnings.

"There is perhaps no area of public policy where scientific rigour is required in shaping policy making than in dealing with the challenge of climate change," he said. "Today, as we launch the fourth generation of our UK Climate Projections, it is clear that the planet and its weather patterns are changing before our eyes… Just since 2000, [sea] levels have risen around six centimetres, based on a global-average rise of 3.2mm a year. Our seas are storing increasing amounts of heat: around half of all ocean warming has occurred since 1997. Even as we take action to slow carbon dioxide pollution now, physics dictates that the climate will keep heating up for decades to come."

Gove added that these changes were resulting in escalating threats to food security, water security, and national security, as well as desertification, extreme weather, and flood risks.

He also argued governments had an obligation to plan for the worst case scenarios - tacitly rejecting suggestions from some Conservative colleagues that the UK is likely to experience only modest climate impacts in the coming decades.

"It is, of course, impossible for anyone to predict the future with absolute certainty," Gove said. "But we are in the UK fortunate to have climate scientists whose knowledge and experience are world-leading. In producing this first major update of climate projections for nearly 10 years, they have given governments, local authorities, land managers, national infrastructure bodies and other businesses an invaluable set of tools with which to assess the nature and scale of challenges, and take decisions accordingly… It is because we know further climate changes are inevitable - notwithstanding strenuous international efforts to limit their extent - that we are planning for a wide range of possible futures. It would be irresponsible in the circumstances to do otherwise."

He said this approach is specifically being applied by the Environment Agency, which is now preparing for 4C of warming when planning flood defences.

Chair of the Environment Agency, Emma Howard Boyd, today urged businesses to work with the agency to step up flood management efforts. "It is not too late to act," she said. "Working together - governments, business, and communities - we can mitigate the impacts of climate change and adapt to a different future. The Environment Agency cannot wall up the country, but will be at the forefront - protecting communities, building resilience, and responding to incidents."

Gove stressed that he also wanted to see businesses play a more proactive role in flood management efforts, arguing there was a "need for communities and businesses to work alongside government to reduce their own flood risk".

"We want to see more businesses designing in resilience when they invest in new buildings," he added. "The climate projections provide high-quality data about the nature of the risks to help steer these new flood investments."

He also signalled a shift in the government's approach to flood management could be in the pipeline, which will result in some areas being left more exposed to more flooding.

"[There is a] need to achieve a balance between limiting the likelihood of flooding and upgrading our resilience to it when it happens," he said, arguing that the government had to explore "how much to spend on reducing the risks that homes and businesses will flood, and how much to spend on helping people to cope if and when they are flooded".

"It will not always be possible to prevent every flood," he said. "We cannot build defences to protect every single building or reinforce every retreating coast line. We will be looking at ways we can encourage every local area to strive for greater overall resilience that takes into account all the different levers from land use planning to better water storage upstream, and tackles both flood prevention and response."

The approach is set to fleshed out next year in a long term policy statement from the government and a new 50-year strategy from the Environment Agency.

More broadly, Gove signalled a raft of further policies are in the pipeline, including changes to the National Policy Statement to encourage the development of more drought-resistant water infrastructure and reservoirs; the release next year of a new long term emissions reduction plan for agriculture, featuring reforms on fertiliser use among other measures; a new England Peat Strategy and a consultation on a English Tree Strategy, both of which will be launched next year; and an imminent Resource and Waste Strategy, which will focus on ending "the environmental, economic, and moral scandal of food waste".

Finally, Gove said the UK should continue to play a proactive role in tackling climate risks on the world stage, arguing that 2020 represented a critical year for global climate efforts.

"This will be five years after the Paris Agreement on Climate Change and levels of climate ambition will be reviewed and revised with the aim of closing the gap between current climate commitments and the well below 2C objective," he explained. "Key to securing these commitments will be significantly improving the availability of finance for climate adaptation in developing countries. That is one of the reasons why the UK has decided to prioritise climate resilience in 2019.

"Between now and 2020 it is also critical that we better connect the international climate negotiations with those focused on nature and biodiversity. It is impossible to meet climate mitigation and climate adaptation objectives without the natural environment, and we can't save nature without tackling climate change."

He added that as such the Convention on Biological Diversity Conference Of Parties 15 summit in China in 2020 presented "an opportunity to push for a new international agreement, similar in scale and scope as the Paris Agreement on climate change, but focused on halting and then reversing the crisis facing the natural world".