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Three main areas are being discussed in at the G8 Summit in Heiligendamm, Germany.
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With climate change high on the agenda for the G8 leaders this week, our map shows predicted typical hottest days of the year in the capital cities of each member country with a 2 °C warming in global mean temperature, likely within 50 years. A recent independent review concluded that: 'It is beyond dispute that the Met Office Hadley Centre occupies a position at the pinnacle of world climate science and in translating that science into policy advice.' |
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| Typical hottest days with 2 °C warming | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| London | Paris | Rome | Washington DC | Ottawa | Moscow | Tokyo | Berlin | |
| Average hottest day (1987-2006) | 32.2 | 34.3 | 34.8 | 37.0 | 33.5 | 31.4 | 36.2 | 34.1 |
| Typical hottest days by 2057 | 37.0 | 39.0 | 38.9 | 42.1 | 39.1 | 35.1 | 39.5 | 36.8 |
Met Office role
Since 1990 the Met Office Hadley Centre has been researching climate change, based on 20 years' earlier expertise in climate research, and variability in order to inform the UK government. Partly funded by Defra, and partly by the MoD, the Met Office remit is to:
- provide world-class research into climate change and variability which contributes to UK government policy objectives;
- provide the evidence basis for climate change, i.e., how much is climate changing and why is changing;
- define and assess the risks of dangerous climate change;
- provide scientific assessments of various mitigation options, e.g. what would happen if we reduced CO2 emissions by 20% within 10 years;
- provide projections of future climate change and impacts in order to enable Defra to both formulate and deliver policies - in particular to adapt to unavoidable climate change;
- communicate our findings nationally and internationally, in particular to other scientists; government departments and the media;
- provide ad hoc advice to the UK government.
The future
The Met Office uses an extremely powerful and complex supercomputer to produce our vital climate change research. As the challenges we face from climate change increase so does the need for an even more powerful supercomputer. While continuing our world-leading research, the Met Office will be actively working with Defra and MoD to obtain funding to increase our supercomputer capacity.
