A little role-play if you will
It’s August in 2090. You sit on your patio enjoying a glass of 2054 Derbyshire vintage, widely regarded as some of the best wine in the world after southern France became too hot to grow grapevines. While you would prefer a Cornwall champagne, it’s best to be prudent with one’s finances. The Sun is beating down from a clear blue sky as you read a report on the recent wildfires consuming the North Yorkshire moors. The Government’s bungling this year’s malaria outbreak, you notice from another report; 1,700 cases, up 4% from last year. Scandalous!
Why don’t people just not go to the malarial swamps of Norfolk? What’s there to see, a few century old ruins of cities and the Ipswitch Ruin Visitor Centre?
You go back inside after ten minutes, there’s only so much of the 45 degree heat one can take, even with a cool wine. The hum of the airconditioner takes some getting used to, though.
Your children arrive home from school after being on a visit to a museum. “Dad,” one of them calls, “Did we really used to have white bears? They look so funny!”
You reply that they didn’t live around here, but in the Arctic.
“The Arctic?” The child gives you a puzzled look. “Bears don’t live in the sea.”
You tell him that the Arctic used to be all ice, all year round. The child shoots you one of his grins and says “Dad, you’re so silly.”
Does all this come out of some crazy futuristic sci-fi movie? Nope, it comes from the Met Office’s UK Climate Projections 2009 report.