Keeping pace as temperatures rise. 

By Anna Collins – Senior Account Director 

The UK has recorded its hottest summer since national records began in 1884 with a peak of 38.1 degrees Celsius. 54 Met Office stations broke their all-time daily maximum-temperature records, and more than half of England and all of Wales entered drought conditions.

Across Western Europe, June and July were the warmest period on record. Low rainfall and river flows disrupted water supply, irrigation and energy production. Wildfires showed how quickly climate impacts can overwhelm systems. Climate risk is no longer a future scenario. It is testing infrastructure, institutions and communities now.

Climate resilience often begins with physical infrastructure: electricity networks, flood protection and water systems. But there is growing concern that many countries, including the UK, have simply failed to invest at the pace required. Preparing for future risks requires people to act together, and that starts with everyone understanding those risks. But agreement is becoming harder, and risks are moving faster than our ability to respond.

Recent debates on wildfires bring this issue into sharp focus. On the one hand, authoritative figures stress the relationship with climate change and the need to tackle that. Others say climate change is not the problem but a convenient excuse for policy failures, such as the ban on controlled fires in favour of rewilding which – they say – is turning the countryside into a tinderbox.

Information is increasingly fragmented and trust in institutions is under pressure. Scientific evidence, emergency warnings and infrastructure advice compete with politically charged interpretations and online narratives. Debate can shift from how society should respond to whether the risk is exceptional, what caused it and whose expertise should count.

Yet despite these polarised debates, preparation for climate resilience cannot depend on everyone sharing the same views about climate change or net zero. Authorities must still communicate the reality of more extreme weather and maintain systems capable of supporting communities before, during and after disruption.

In my home country of Australia, managing climate resilience has had to become a major economic and policy priority and increasingly the messaging is often less focused on the causes of climate change and more on practical adaptation. Discussions centre on living with greater heat, drought and wildfire risk, protecting communities, safeguarding economic productivity and ensuring critical infrastructure can continue to operate under increasingly extreme conditions. Resilience is increasingly framed as a matter of risk management rather than ideology, helping to build support for investment across political and community divides.

That distinction matters. While debates about climate science and net zero will continue, infrastructure decisions cannot wait for consensus on every aspect of the climate challenge. Successful resilience strategies create that shared sense of purpose by connecting abstract future threats to tangible local outcomes: reliable energy supplies, secure water resources, safer communities and stronger economies.

In the UK, building new reservoirs, grid capacity, renewable generation and flood protection all require political commitment, institutional trust and public consent sustained over many years. They also require a ‘needs’ narrative that is persuasive, responsive to challenge and capable of turning recognised need into functioning infrastructure.

The resilience debate usually asks what we need to build. The harder question is whether we can agree on a course of action and if our institutions can move at the pace emerging risks demand. Climate resilience is therefore exposing not only an infrastructure gap, but a communication gap that risks delaying action until consequences become critical.