James Dent

Nature of company:
Independent Consultant Hydrology and Meteorology

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James Dent

Profile summary:
Environmental Consultant – James Dent, FRMetS, CMet, CEnv
James Dent has extensive UK and international experience in water and climate matters, with professional registrations in Meteorology, Hydrology and Environmental Science. He has held consultancy appointments with the UK Meteorological Office, Environment Agency, Natural England, the World Meteorological Organisation, and major civil engineering and development companies. For 3 years he was the British Water representative on the UK Committee for National and International Hydrology.

Profile:
SENSITIVITIES OF BUSINESS TO CLIMATE AND WEATHER
Apart from the obvious, such as frozen pipes and rain coming through the roof, many other influences related to climate and weather can play a part in a wide range of businesses. Business has also to take account of the various policy directives, initiatives, guidance and legislation that have sprung up in recent years as a consequence of concerns regarding climate-change.

Some of the issues may be straightforward, and as much to do with common-sense as to full awareness of how the weather can act as an influence. Initiatives to cut down carbon emissions are really another way of saving energy, which means saving money, but perhaps the “action and outcome” may be a little hard to understand in detail. As an example, installing a photo-voltaic power generating system or solar water heating can be reduced to a simple arithmetic exercise of capital outlay, income and saving over a period of operation. To estimate how much operating and maintenance costs may change under a changed future climate is likely to be a lot more problematical.

Given the general experience in the British Isles over the last 2 or 3 years, one would be forgiven to ask – “Well when is this going to happen?” “How much do I really have to do to be resilient?”

Evaluating climate risk must not ignore the vast amount of information to be obtained from analysis of long-term records. These can be obtained from many public and private sources, and can help to identify weather and climate based risks. For instance, how many times have heavy rainfall, high wind or extreme temperatures affected your business operations? Would it help to factor-in possible changes in your future planning? If the projected climate were to cause the incidence of these events to increase (or decrease) by 5%, would this be operation critical? More important, if you were to invest on a particular climate projection, does its probability make it cost-effective?

A careful study of weather and climate associated risk could be of considerable benefit to your organisation.

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