East coast sailing as we know it may become a thing of the past if scientists are correct. Recent studies reveal that the ice sheet covering Greenland is likely to begin an irreversible melting process if greenhouse emissions are not dramatically reduced – a temperature increase as low as 2.7°C could result in a sea level rise of up to 7m. This would completely change the character of the south-eastern corner of the UK, obliterating popular ports such as Portsmouth and Lowestoft, and destroying the Blackwater and Crouch estuaries as they are known today.

Climatologists from Reading University have calculated that the ‘threshold’ temperature of 2.7°C, above which the melting of the ice-sheet exceeds the snowfall, will be reached within half a century. The melting process, which is likely to take as long as 1,000 years, would progressively destroy huge areas of land and some countries, such as the Maldives, would be entirely flooded.