The programme also says the United Kingdom is not immune from the rise in extreme weather. Peter Midgley of the Environment Agency is responsible for sea defences along the Sussex coast in southern England. He told Costing the Earth there was a growing risk to life. In the past, we felt it would be less than once in every lifetime that you'd see a serious flood which could cause real damage and potential loss of life. I think given the way things are going, with sea levels rising and increasing storminess, it might be that in 40 or 50 years' time you'd be seeing one, two or possibly three floods of that sort of magnitude within a lifetime.
Lives certainly are at risk.
The last serious coastal flooding we had was in the early fifties on the east coast of England, with well over 200 deaths. The risk is there, it could easily happen, and you could get even greater casualties.