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Train tracks go vertically across the photo. The metal rail have wooden sleepers in between them and rocks between the sleepers.

Railway tracks

Infrastructure across Scotland operates as a connected system and not in isolation. It means impacts from extreme weather and climate-related risks can cascade from one sector or operator to another, causing significant disruption to essential services, transport, and business operations. To effectively respond to and manage these shared climate-related risks, infrastructure organisations across Scotland need to work together to share knowledge and resources.

The Adaptation Scotland programme recently worked alongside Network Rail to co-host a collaborative industry-led workshop in Edinburgh, bringing together more than 50 organisations to share experiences of impacts from climate change and extreme weather, and ideas on how organisations present could best work together to collaboratively build resilience to future risks.

The event had 4 key objectives:

Presentations from infrastructure operators – including Scottish Gas Networks, Network Rail, Scottish Water, and Scottish Power Energy Networks – set the scene for the challenges of adapting to climate change and the barriers to working together with other infrastructure operators to adapt to shared climate risks, as well as good examples of adaptation in action.

Presentations from experts including Professor Paul Davies, Principal Fellow in Weather and Climate Extremes and Impacts at the Met Office, Caitlin Douglas, Senior Analyst UK Climate Change Risk Assessment at the Climate Change Committee, and Dr Helen Adams from King’s College London, who provided an overview of the recently announced ‘Maximising UK adaptation to climate change (MACC) Hub’, where Verture will lead the Scotland ‘spoke’ alongside the University of Glasgow.

Following a series of collaborative activities, participants identified a shortlist of key activities to take forward future research and action by working together. These include:

To take this work forward, a new ‘Climate Ready Infrastructure Forum’ for Scotland has been proposed. This will be an action-oriented group, to take forward discrete, and tactical research and development initiatives, with the initial priorities being those emerging from the workshop. The Adaptation Scotland programme will continue to support this industry-led initiative and help to connect the Forum with adaptation action being led by regional adaptation initiatives.

I was really heartened to see the enthusiasm in the room during the event, and the strong desire from others to work closer together to address the shared challenges associated with our changing climate in Scotland. We’ll now turn our efforts to formalising a ‘group’ that will build on the momentum gained at this event’, and look to foster the closer collaboration that many of us know will be essential to creating infrastructure and services in Scotland that are resilient to changes in climate.

David Harkin, Weather Resilience and Climate Change Adaptation Strategy Manager, Network Rail

To find out more about the event and the Forum, please contact David Harkin ([email protected]) or Jonny Casey ([email protected]).

A bridge stretches across a river into the distance.

The Tay Bridge

The Adaptation Scotland programme is supporting the formation of a new regional adaptation partnership in Tayside to address climate risks. We are inviting local people and organisations to help shape a shared vision and priorities through sector-specific events.

The climate in Tayside is changing and the region is experiencing warmer, wetter weather, increased storms, and higher sea levels, all of which is set to continue even if we achieved net zero tomorrow. We need to adapt to these changes to allow us to become more resilient and ensure Tayside can continue to flourish.

At this early stage, we want to involve people and organisations across the region in defining a shared vision and priorities for the new partnership. Four sector specific events have been designed to provide opportunities for different groups to have a say in what the partnership could be, what it could do and how it could work, and we are inviting people who live or work in the area to join in.

Each workshop will explore how a regional partnership can advance adaptation in Tayside, using these three key questions:

Each event will run from 12:30pm – 3pm with lunch available from 12:15pm. Space is limited, so we ask you to register no more than 2 people per organisation or group. If you want more people to attend, please contact the Adaptation Scotland programme team at Verture, and we will do our best to accommodate you.

Please register via Eventbrite for the event most relevant to you. Each event will be tailored to that audience. If you are unable to attend your preferred event, please contact us rather than booking onto another event.