Climate Change Adaptation and

National Grid and Network Rail recognise that meeting the challenges of climate change is not only about reducing greenhouse gas emissions and developing a low-carbon economy but also ensuring that companies adapt to climate change such as; incremental hotter drier summers, warmer and wetter winters, coastal and river bed erosion and increasingly frequent extreme weather events such as floods.

In addition infrastructure is highly interconnected. There are also interconnections between the infrastructure components both within and between the Transport, Gas, Electric and Water sectors. Where these interconnections are associated with the supply or receipt of a service on which the receiving sector is reliant an impact on this supply could be critical.

Key vulnerabilities in the energy and transport sectors are those associated with higher temperatures and an increased intensity of precipitation and therefore flooding. Other possible vulnerabilities may include changes in wind, increased frequency of lightning etc.

These presentations will outline National Grid’s adaptation journey from 2006 through to the present day and beyond briefly discussing future research within this field, whilst the Rail Industry will describe the impacts of climate change and the challenges on its operations, vehicles and infrastructure.