By Nick Morrison

Aye it is, so what’s new?

The earliest recorded embankment raising was in 1879 and again in the 30’s yet again when the Thames barrier was installed. Consideration is now apparently being given to raising them yet again along with the 300Km of other embankments gates and indeed the Thames Barrier which is having to be raised about twice as frequently as was first anticipated.

Thames Barrier from the air Photo credit: Thomas Nugent

The reasons for sinking are also well known. During the last Ice age the sheer weight of ice pushed Scotland and Scandinavia down into the Mantle. with the weight gone, it is now rising and the British Isles is tipping like a see saw. In the vicinity of Oban you can even see a sea stack like the Old man of Hoy on dry land.

What is new is the latest IPCC UN report on  Global Warming which gives us a scant 12 years to fix the CO2 rise. Runaway global warming will give us a sea level rise of 70 meters. The Orkney archipelago would be unrecognisable. We Europeans emit around 11 Tons of CO2/Yr (Americans 24T/yr, 5 1/2 is world average). The ONLY way to curb this CO2 emission is a wholesale switch to renewable energy systems– wind, solar, tide and wave and switch from hydrocarbon fuels to Hydrogen which we can make from renewable energy.

What is also new is what sections of the Scientific press are calling a wholesale assault on renewables by Westminster. We have seen in recent weeks the canceling of the FIT on solar which will destroy the UK Solar industry worth millions, and put hundreds out of work and the defunding of a Green power station plus the cancellation of a carbon capture project.

London is sinking we need more renewable energy “Now is not the time” to be cutting it back.

This film was made in 2014 but it’s a simple explanation of what is happening.