EnergyOMNI's Perspectives｜UK Launches First Taskforce To Strengthen Climate Security

Edited by EnergyOMNI

UK Climate Minister Katie White announced on 26 June 2026 the establishment of a new Expert Taskforce, which will advise the government on how to better anticipate and respond to the growing risks that climate change poses to national security.

The taskforce will be co-chaired by Climate Minister Katie White and Security Minister Dame Angela Eagle. It will meet regularly to identify gaps in the UK's preparedness for climate security risks and to assess the most serious threats that climate change and nature loss pose to national security. The taskforce will also review existing resilience-building efforts across government departments and put forward concrete recommendations to strengthen the UK's overall preparedness and response capacity.

The UK's 2025 National Security Strategy explicitly identifies climate change and nature loss as core drivers of global instability, economic disruption and security risks. Climate change risks increasingly cross borders and sectors, creating knock-on effects for migration, access to food and water, energy systems, supply chains and financial stability.

Climate Minister Katie White said that climate change is not a distant issue, but a security challenge that is reshaping the world in which we live. The purpose of establishing the new taskforce is to ensure that the UK is as well prepared as possible to respond to the various security challenges created by climate change. The taskforce will take a cross-government and integrated approach to climate security, with its work including:

• Assessing how climate impacts overseas can translate into domestic pressures in the UK, including the consequences of more people around the world living in climate-vulnerable conditions and the implications for the UK.
• Analysing the risks facing the UK and the global economy, including the potential consequences when assets, infrastructure or entire regions become too risky to insure or invest in.
• Examining rising geopolitical tensions in regions such as the Arctic, where melting ice is creating new security challenges.
  
  

The global climate think tank E3G notes that, in addition to the UK's establishment of a climate security taskforce, more than 60 countries around the world now refer to climate security in their national security or defence strategies. As early as 2018, the Pacific Islands Forum's Boe Declaration identified climate change as the single greatest security threat to the region. Japan incorporated climate issues into its 2022 National Security Strategy, while Germany's 2025 National Climate Risk Assessment identified climate change as a direct threat to national resilience and European security.

Climate change is no longer simply a "threat multiplier"; it is increasingly becoming a geopolitical force in its own right, reshaping energy systems, international trade, industrial policy, migration, national resilience, and competition over critical minerals and clean-technology supply chains. However, E3G also points out that establishing a credible and effective climate security policy requires the integration of defence, diplomacy, development assistance, finance and resilience-building measures. Otherwise, governments risk merely "securitising" climate change without actually improving security.

The Climate Security Expert Taskforce was established during the government of Keir Starmer, and it remains to be seen whether the new government will make effective use of the taskforce and enable it to play an active role. This year could also see the emergence of a super El Niño, which could lead to a significant rise in global temperatures and more extreme weather events. In August, Labour MP Chris Hinchliff urged Prime Minister Andy Burnham to take urgent action and chair the Climate and Nature Security Taskforce.