Green blob in control at Environment Agency

I can't help feeling that the resignation of Environment Agency chairman Sir Philip Dilley was all a bit overdone. As chairman, he doesn't presumably actually involve himself in the day-to-day running of the place; that's the job of the chief executive. The chairman is supposed to set the strategic direction, which is not something you even really want to be thinking about in the middle of a major crisis. Frankly a beach in Barbados was probably the best place for him while there were major floods around.

Now you can certainly take potshots at Sir Philip for the general state of the Environment Agency, which appears to be both thoroughly incompetent and riddled with corruption, but he was at least an engineer by background. Take a look at who has stepped into his shoes, at least on a temporary basis: the green blob personified. Emma Howard Boyd appears to have made a career in "corporate social responsibility" and is a director of a green investment fund as well as having roles in any number of green NGOs.

It will be interesting to see if they keep her on.

On the floods in Cumbria

The floods in Cumbria are obviously attracting a lot of attention this morning. A couple of things are exercising my mind.

Firstly, as readers are pointing out, the claim that 340mm of rain fell in 24 hours seems suspect. Nobody seems quite sure where it came from. I have seen it suggested that this was the amount that fell over two days and in Unthreaded, Mike Post wonders if it is actually the November rainfall total.

Secondly, how do we know what the 100-year flood is in any given river basin? The process looks less than straightforward and involves a wealth of assumptions.

The first assumption is often but not always valid and should be tested on a case by case basis. The second assumption is often valid if the extreme events are observed under similar climate conditions. For example, if the extreme events on record all come from late summer thunder storms (as is the case in the southwest U.S.), or from snow pack melting (as is the case in north-central U.S.), then this assumption should be valid. If, however, there are some extreme events taken from thunder storms, others from snow pack melting, and others from hurricanes, then this assumption is most likely not valid. The third assumption is only a problem when trying to forecast a low, but maximum flow event (for example, an event smaller than a 2-year flood). Since this is not typically a goal in extreme analysis, or in civil engineering design, then the situation rarely presents itself. The final assumption about stationarity is difficult to test from data for a single site because of the large uncertainties in even the longest flood records^[3] (see next section). More broadly, substantial evidence of climate change strongly suggests that the probability distribution is also changing^[7] and that managing flood risks in the future will become even more difficult.^[8] The simplest implication of this is that not all of the historical data are, or can be, considered valid as input into the extreme event analysis.

Lots to dig into.

Update on Dec 7, 2015 by Bishop Hill

On Twitter, Derek Sorensen tracks it down to Honister.

The ASA is a kangaroo court

Americans tend to be completely taken aback when they learn that the UK has a body that rules on what can and cannot be said in the public sphere; they see the Advertising Standards Agency as an affront to the hallowed principle of free speech. A ruling against an advertisement in the Telegraph by US unconventional gas company Breitling suggests that they are right to do so.

This is not the first time that the ASA has been called on to adjudicate in a shale gas case. Last year, shale gas operator Cuadrilla was hauled up in front of them after a complaint about a leaflet it had distributed. Some of the ASA's ruling was bizarre. For example, a statement that

Click to read more ...

Rank renewables - Josh 284

Another story about mad 'renewables', this time a scheme for burning rubbish (which presumably increases CO2 emissions). The company 'Waste4fuel' have piled up 20,000 tonnes of rubbish but neglected to burn any of it for energy, leaving it, for a number of years, to stink out the neighbourhood and spontaneously catch fire - read about it on the Mail or Express websites, even on the BBC website. 

Cartoons by Josh

Lord Smith on Owen Paterson

Leo Hickman pointed this morning to an interview with Lord Smith, the head of the Environment Agency, in the Guardian this morning saying that Smith had said that "Owen Paterson does not accept that global warming is due to CO2".

As I have noted in the past, Paterson seems quite clear that carbon dioxide emissions can affect the climate, so this is a bit of a surprise. However, although the article itself repeats the allegation, the words it quotes Smith as saying about Paterson are actually about something slightly different:

He recognises weather patterns are changing and that something is happening to the climate. But he doesn’t necessarily accept that it’s down to the CO2 we are throwing into the atmosphere. I wish he had a better view on that.

Click to read more ...

A ghostly message

Updated on Feb 16, 2014 by Bishop Hill

Updated on Feb 16, 2014 by Bishop Hill

Updated on Feb 16, 2014 by Bishop Hill

Commenter "Corporal Jones' Ghost' left this comment on one of the flooding threads. It looks to be quite important.

I want to tell you what really has happened on the Somerset Levels.

I am remaining anonymous for good reason, I think you'll understand why.

You have to go back to 1939, when the MOD decided that they needed a new Munitions factory for HDX explosives, HDX uses a lot of water, all munitions manufacture does, but HDX is greedy.

The levels had too much water and so we built one on the Levels, ROF37 or ROF Bridgewater or ROF Woolavington, it's all the same place.

To ensure that there was enough water even on the waterlogged Levels, we built the Huntspill River, we then connected it to the River Brue to the North and the Kings Sedgemoor Drain via a pipe to the South, we also widened the River Sowy to get water to our factory.

Click to read more ...

Floods of PR - Josh 257

 But to be clear, we love water voles!

Cartoons by Josh

Greenery is bad for you

The Mail is reporting that the lower reaches of the Thames were not dredged because the Environment Agency saw its first duty as being to protect a rare mollusc.

In a 2010 report, seen by the Mail, they ruled out dredging between Datchet and Staines because the river bed was home to the vulnerable creatures.

And even though a public consultation indicated support for de-silting work, the quango said it would be ‘environmentally unacceptable’ due to the ‘high impact on aquatic species’.

I can accept that dredging is not a panacea - a point made in New Scientist today - but it is becoming very clear that greenery has been put ahead of human welfare. The tendency for civil servants to put their own interests ahead of those of members of the public who pay their salaries has long been noted. For them to put the interests of voles and shellfish ahead of the public interest too is new. Heads need to roll.

EA working with Labour against government?

Inside the Environment Agency is reporting that he has received a letter from a potential whistleblower who claims to have evidence that Agency officials are conspiring with the Labour party to undermine the government.

I have been following your blog for the last few months. You make some truthful claims but they are only the tip of the iceberg. I have been working for the Environment Agency as a team leader for six years. Your last post on political hypocrisy is what has prompted this email. I can give you the evidence you need showing senior managers in the South West conspiring with Labour MPs to discredit this government over the past two to three years, which I believe have made the floods far worse than they otherwise would have been. The MPs involved are: xxxxx (edited out for legal reasons - Labour MPs based in South West towns and cities)

There's always the possibility that it's not true, but it might be worth laying in supplies of popcorn, just in case.

+++Alas Smith+++

In his interview with the Today programme this morning, Environment Agency chairman Lord Smith was asked about the idea that it was the policy of the Agency to allow the Somerset Levels to flood (audio below; 7:00mins for key quotes). Smith was asked specifically about a policy document from 2008 which referred to the possibility - so-called option 6 - of allowing parts of the Levels to flood:

Policy Unit 8- Somerset Levels and Moors

Policy option 6 – Take action to increase the frequency of flooding to deliver benefits locally or elsewhere, which may constitute an overall flood risk reduction.

Note: This policy option involves a strategic increase in flooding in allocated areas, but is not intended to affect the risk to individual properties.

Click to read more ...

Follow the money

Updated on Feb 10, 2014 by Bishop Hill

The torrent of claim and counterclaim about the floods continues apace. Last night Twitter was abuzz with environmentalists trying to defend Lord Smith, the head of the Environment Agency, while those of a more sceptical bent (myself included) were furiously pointing out some of the flaws in the argument.

Some have been making the claim that dredging would not have prevented the floods on the Levels, but as David Rose pointed out in the Mail on Sunday yesterday, not all of the area is a dredging-free zone.

Dramatic confirmation can be seen just a few miles away, in the northern part of the Levels.

At the Gold Corner pumping station, three giant pumps are still lifting the waters from the rivers Axe and Brue up seven feet into the Huntspill Drain – an artificial watercourse about 100ft wide which runs straight to the sea.

Click to read more ...

The big EAsy

The attempts to link the flooding in the south of England to climate don't seemed to have gained much traction and attention is now turning to the performance of the Environment Agency, which is probably where it should have been all along.

The Sunday Telegraph says that agency chairman Lord Smith is under pressure, not least because he has no fewer than ten other jobs, while James Forsyth in the Mail on Sunday reckons that Owen Paterson is already looking around for a replacement. Even the organiser of the Glastonbury festival - an enthusiastic climate change campaigner - seems to think that the problem is more to do with the agency's refusal to dredge rivers than global warming.

Flooding flak

Inside the Environment Agency has collated a fascinating collection of stories in the local media about the floods. You get the impression that outside the insular world of London liberal media folk the story is about the performance of the agency rather than Owen Paterson's belief or otherwise in climate change.

Click to read more ...

Flooding risk

A reader sent me this. Take a look at the Environment Agency flood risk map. Zoom in on a bit of coastline of your choice. My reader points out that the areas between a the high and low tide marks appear to be flagged up as being at risk of flooding.

True, but misleading?