Dry spell is a reminder of the fallacy of climate change denial - Andy Brown

It has been a relentless summer. Weeks of drought conditions have dried up fields and left the stubble of cut down wheat crops a near perfect target for any discarded cigarette to set off a dangerous fire. On the hills little of our moorlands remain soaking wet bogs. The land lies exposed with even the very ground beneath our feet at risk of burning.

Looking out over the Yorkshire Dales you can see mile after mile of bone dry grasslands amid huge expanses of heather that could catch fire with ease.

This is generating very genuine concerns about reckless behaviour from some of the public. In weather conditions like these the last thing we need are people lighting barbecues or discarding glass bottles.

Yet these are not the only kinds of irresponsible behaviour that are putting farmers’ livelihoods at risk and stretching our fire service beyond its limits.

In circumstances like these, not taking climate change seriously is every bit as irresponsible. There is a real contradiction between the lived experience of increasingly severe hot weather and the willingness of political decision makers to take action that might limit damage from burning fossils.

It isn’t normal to have summer temperatures which smash through the records set in the exceptional summer of 1976 by a full two degrees. It isn’t normal to have day after day of 30 degree plus temperatures in Britain. Nor is it normal to have heat records broken across the whole of Western Europe.

These aren’t problems impacting on just one part of the world. This summer there are exceptionally hot weather conditions and wildfires across Canada. India has suffered an intensely hot monsoon. Sea ice in the Arctic is melting at record rates and the extra dark areas of the ocean are adding to the problem.

The response of politicians to these early signs of climate change have not been impressive. Donald Trump and his associates have decided that there is still a lot of money to be made from pumping out fossil fuels and opted to drill, baby, drill. If that approach is adopted then the rest of us are doomed to burn, baby, burn. It is the political equivalent of lighting up the barbie in the middle of a wheat field.

Worryingly our new government seems to have decided that it also would quite like to go slowly on the transition to a green economy and rush to drill for new oil and gas that will have to be sold and burned for 20 years to pay back on the investment. If we genuinely care about energy security we would be providing every home with battery storage so we could halve bills and reduce peak time demand quickly, cheaply and reliably.

Yet failure to act fast enough to limit the scale of the steadily mounting crisis is only part of the irresponsibility of politicians and decision makers. The other area of failure lies in not preparing properly to adapt to changes in the climate.

As droughts and wildfires become more serious our farmers need financial support for the cost of changes in approach. Wheat fields that stretch for almost a mile are a very high risk production method when land is bone dry. Over stretched fire crews have struggled to control blazes on such fields which can get out of control in minutes in high winds and drought conditions. Some very brave farmers have stepped in to help neighbours by trying to create fire breaks. They are taking risks with their lives and won’t always succeed.

It is possible to reduce the fire risk by planting strips of arable crops to break up wheat fields. They are harder to burn but there are financial consequences from smaller crop areas and farmers are going to need help to act. Increasing the amount of arable and reducing sheep grazing are other ways to manage fire risk whilst maintaining food security that deserve more subsidy.

Above all we need to rethink land use in upland areas. Peat areas should be wet and difficult to burn. Dried out grouse moors with heather that goes up in flames as easily as tinder can catch fire so drastically that the carbon in the soil burns.

It is often argued that the only way to deal with this problem is controlled burns of small areas of heather. The reality is that the problem only exists because of the amount of land covered by grouse moors which produce next to no food but are very prone to burning.

It is neither good for food security nor good for fire prevention to devote huge areas of our upland to entertaining investment bankers who want to play at being nineteenth century country shooting gentlemen.

When farming land is covered with solar panels people are rightly asking why they aren’t going onto car parks. Yet much more of our land is covered with wasteful heather moors that enhance fire risk without facing similar challenge.

It is vitally important that individuals behave responsibly in the countryside and don’t risk starting fires. It is every bit as important that governments behave responsibly and tackle both the causes and the consequences of climate change with energy and determination.

Andy Brown is Green Party councillor for Aire Valley.