Impacts on SW and
background information
Sectors:
- Agriculture and Forestry
- Biodiversity
- Business and Utilities
- Housing and Construction
- Local Government
- Tourism
- Transport
Warming to the idea*
*SW Climate Change Impact Scoping Study including report summary and technical report
Young Climate Change
Champion - SW
Aim:
To engage businesses throughout the South West in addressing their vulnerability to the effects of climate change and maximising the opportunities that arise.
Lead contacts:
Business - Alex Webb (alex.webb@environment-agency.gov.uk) of Climate SouthWest.
Utilities - Neil Whiter (nwhiter@southwestwater.co.uk) of South West Water.
Latest Progress Report
The Climate SouthWest Business and Utilities Sector Group has been re-formed as a Business e-network. The network exists to support the continued communication of climate change adaptation messages through existing business support organisations.
Climate SouthWest is currently running a project to explore how businesses in the South West have been affected by extreme weather over the past 18 months, and how resilient they are to future events. The project builds on the idea of a Local Climate Impacts Profile (LCLIP), which is a tool originally designed to help local authorities identify the impacts of severe weather on their services, improve their risk assessment processes and identify suitable management responses. The aim of Climate SouthWest's 'Business LCLIP' is to build up an evidence base of the implications for business from the snow over last winter, as well as flood, heatwave, drought and storm events over recent years. As part of the project, an online survey is being conducted among businesses across the region, which will help to inform future programmes of advice and support on the theme of business resilience.
Previous Climate SouthWest activity in the Business and Utilities sector includes:
Business vulnerability to extreme weather in the South West: understanding the baseline (May 2010) - In 2010, an MSc student from the University of Exeter was selected to undertake a research project, 'Business vulnerability to extreme weather in the South West: understanding the baseline', which sought to identify whether certain business types/sectors/sizes are more vulnerable to extreme weather than others and to investigate the nature of that vulnerability. The key findings and the full report are both available from the Tools page of this website.
Case studies: Climate SouthWest has published a number of adaptation case studies, including; Western Power Distribution's flood protection work for a major substation site in Exeter; and National Grid's climate change adaptation work on managing risks. These can be found on the case studies - business & utilities page.
Managing risk: Maximising business capability in extreme conditions (2010) - In Spring 2010, Climate SouthWest teamed up with Business Link and the Cornwall Sustainable Tourism Project (CoaST) to deliver workshops for businesses on improving their resilience to extreme weather. The Climate SouthWest presentation that was delivered as part of the workshops can be downloaded here: Climate Change and Severe Weather: improving business resilience (ppt 2.2Mb).
Climate Change: Are You Prepared? During March 2009 Climate SouthWest offered a programme of free half-day workshops for small businesses in the Agriculture, Construction, Food and Drink, and Tourism sectors to help them prepare for the effects of climate change. A final report detailing the outcomes and feedback from the
workshops is available on request. The workshop presentations include useful, sector-specific information on the science, impacts and adaptation responses to climate change and can be downloaded here:
Agriculture workshop (pdf 2Mb)
Construction workshop (pdf 2.5Mb)
Food & Drink workshop (pdf 1.8Mb)
Tourism workshop (pdf 1.8Mb)
Tools
Please visit our Tools page for access to relevant tools and reports for the Business and Utilities sector.
