Videogame world, digital download
Published 12 October 2019
In which the UK Climate Projections meet Minecraft and “The Warlock of Firetop Mountain” !!
The UK Climate Projections 2018 (UKCP18) provide the most up-to-date assessment of how the climate of the UK may change over the 21st century. They include land projections for the whole of the UK, higher-resolution regional projections, and marine projections for UK waters.
This Minecraft world contains maps of the UK showing how temperatures and rainfall could change in future decades. There are four scenarios, which loosely correspond to how serious governments and business are in combating climate breakdown.
The Climate Quest lets you choose and leads you through a number of future possibilities. Also, each map is labelled, so you can wander and explore to your heart’s content.
Then, if you would like to get stuck in to campaigning for stronger UK climate policies, you could write to your MP and other politicians via Write to Them and/or you could go on Climate Strike with Fridays for Future and join Extinction Rebellion’s direct action.
Download the Climate Quest world – Java Edition
Java Windows/OS version 1.10.2 of Minecraft for desktops and laptops
Download the Climate Quest world – Bedrock Edition
Bedrock (formerly Pocket) Edition for tablets and mobiles, plus Education Edition
BETA – Converted from Java and currently being tested
What the maps show
Mean, maximum and minimum air temperature anomaly at 1.5m (°C)
In other words, the change in average, maximum and minimum daily temperatures, averaged over the period of interest (see Seasons below), compared with the baseline (see below), measures in degrees Celsius.
The projections are derived on a grid with a resolution of 25km over land. Each block, north-south and east-west, represents one grid square.
The changes are presented both in colour, and in three dimensions. So increases in temperature tend towards red and stand out from the maps, and decreases in temperature tend toward blue and go into the maps.
| Map colour | Temperature change (°C) | Map colour | Temperature change (°C) |
| Blue | -3 to -2 | Brown | 4 to 5 |
| Cyan | -2 to -1 | Purple | 5 to 6 |
| Light blue | -1 to 0 | Magenta | 6 to 7 |
| White | 0 to 1 | Pink | 7 to 8 |
| Yellow | 1 to 2 | Black | 8 to 9 |
| Orange | 2 to 3 | Grey | 9 to 10 |
| Red | 3 to 4 | Light grey | 10 to 11 |
Precipitation rate anomaly (%)
In other words, the percentage change in precipitation such as rainfall and snow over the period of interest (see Seasons below), compared with the baseline (see below).
The changes are presented both in colour, and in three dimensions. So increases in precipitation tend towards blue and stand out from the maps, and decreases in precipitation tend toward red and go into the maps.
| Map colour | Precipitation change (%) | Map colour | Precipitation change (%) |
| Pink | -80 to -70 | White | -10 to 0 |
| Magenta | -70 to -60 | Light blue | 0 to 10 |
| Purple | -60 to -50 | Cyan | 10 to 20 |
| Brown | -50 to -40 | Blue | 20 to 30 |
| Red | -40 to -30 | Grey | 30 to 40 |
| Orange | -30 to -20 | Black | 40 to 50 |
| Yellow | -20 to -10 |
Seasons
Each of the four variables is presented as averages across the four seasons and the whole year, which gives 20 maps. These form the arms of a cross, and there is one cross for each decade and each scenario – 28 crosses in total!
The seasons for each variable are within the arms of the cross, read from left to right. The map backgrounds are colour-coded by season, so it should be clear which is which.
| Background colour | Season |
| Lime | Spring – March, April, May |
| Green | Summer – June, July, August |
| Red | Autumn – September, October, November |
| Grey | Winter – December, January, February |
| Light grey | Whole year |
Decades
The projections are provided as 30-year averages, so that year-on-year fluctuations in weather and climate are smoothed out. Each 30-year period is associated with the central decade. There are seven decades in all in the data, but only the 2020s, 2050s and 2080s are included in the Quest.
| 30-year period | Decade |
| 2010-2039 | 2020s |
| 2020-2049 | 2030s |
| 2030-2059 | 2040s |
| 2040-2069 | 2050s |
| 2050-2079 | 2060s |
| 2060-2089 | 2070s |
| 2070-2099 | 2080s |
Baseline
The changes in temperatures and precipitation in each 30-year period are all compared with a baseline 30-year period. The standard baseline used is 1981-2010 (or the 1990s). Projections are also available compared with 1961-199, but are not shown.
Scenarios
The four scenarios presented are known as Representative Concentration Pathways, and reflect the difference between the sunlight absorbed by the Earth and the energy radiated back into space. The more carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, the more energy is retained by the Earth and the less radiated into space. They do not correspond exactly to futures for lower or higher emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. However, parallels can be drawn with adoption of more or less stringent climate policies.
| The RCP2.6 represents the range of lowest scenarios, which requires stringent climate policies to limit emissions. |
| The forcing pathway of the RCP4.5 scenario is comparable to a number of climate policy scenarios and several low-emissions reference scenarios. |
| Most non-climate policy scenarios are close to the emission level of the RCP6.0. |
| RCP8.5 is representative of the high range of non-climate policy scenarios. |
Probability
The projections are a set of probability distributions, and data are available for the 10% (outcome very unlikely to be lower), 50% (median or middle of the range of likely outcomes), and 90% (outcome very unlikely to be higher) probabilities. Only the median is presented in these maps.
More information
The official UKCP18 website – https://ukclimateprojections.metoffice.gov.uk/
Representative Concentration Pathways – https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10584-011-0148-z
“Hundreds of temperature records broken over summer” 2019 – https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-49753680
…as analysed by Berkeley Earth climate institute – http://berkeleyearth.org/
World Meteorological Organisation “Statement on the State of the Global Climate” – https://public.wmo.int/en/our-mandate/climate/wmo-statement-state-of-global-climate
NASA “A Degree of Concern: Why Global Temperatures Matter” –
https://climate.nasa.gov/news/2878/a-degree-of-concern-why-global-temperatures-matter/
IPCC Special Report on “Global Warming of 1.5 ºC” – https://www.ipcc.ch/sr15/
Headline Statements from the Summary for Policymakers – https://www.ipcc.ch/site/assets/uploads/sites/2/2019/06/SR15_Headline-statements.pdf
The Paris Agreement – https://unfccc.int/process-and-meetings/the-paris-agreement/the-paris-agreement
The Guardian series on The polluters – https://www.theguardian.com/environment/series/the-polluters
How I made it
Partly this was a chance to learn some Python, both to get hold of the UKCP18 data and to render it in Minecraft.
The UKCP18 data are free to download at https://ukclimateprojections-ui.metoffice.gov.uk/ (registration required).
There is an API, which allows this to be automated, at https://github.com/ukcp-data/ukcp-api-client. So using Python I downloaded much of the data described at https://ukclimateprojections-ui.metoffice.gov.uk/products/LS1_Maps_01.
Then I followed https://milosophical.me/blog/2018/minecraft-python-2.html to set up the Raspberry Jam Mod and Python coding environment in Minecraft.
Then I had to think long and hard about what I wanted to do, and what I actually could do. There are limitations to the Raspberry Jam Mod and the very similar RaspberryJuice. For example, it doesn’t include any of the sign blocks. So in my script I created the code for a series of command blocks that placed the generic map signs. The Quest signs I had to place one by one.
If I’m going to get more ambitious and create stuff for Bedrock as well as Java editions, I’ll need to investigate alternatives. So far I’ve come up with:
- Lots of development resources – https://minecraft.gamepedia.com/Development_resources
- Minecraft scripting API in Javascript – https://www.minecraft.net/en-us/article/scripting-api-now-public-beta
- Create a computer block – http://www.southampton.ac.uk/~fangohr/blog/gamification-of-python-script-execution-in-minecraft.html
Btw, I created each of the sections of the cross (each weather variable) the same way, then rotated them by 0, 90, 180 or 270 degrees.
“Pour ce qui est de l’avenir, il ne s’agit pas de le prévoir, mais de le rendre possible.”
[As for the future, it is not a question of predicting it, but of making it possible.]
Antoine de Saint Exupéry, Citadelle, 1948
