In the future, the changing climate will significantly alter how Bude’s coastline looks.
We are not alone. Coastlines all around the world are experiencing increasing erosion and flooding due to sea level rise and other climate change factors.
In Bude, situated right beside the full force of the Atlantic, we’re all too familiar with the impact of coastal storms. And as climate change makes weather patterns more extreme, we can expect an increase in the frequency, severity and damage caused by these storms.
The shoreline at Bude is particularly vulnerable because a lower level of sea level rise is required for extreme high-water events, which cause flooding and increase erosion, to become much more frequent.
The far north Cornish coast is unique in that it takes only 0.5m of sea level rise for currently very rare extreme high-water events to become a regular occurrence. Current sea-level rise predictions mean extreme high-water events that now occur once every 100 years will happen at least once a year in Bude by 2070.