With Storms Arwen and Barra passing over the country, many communities are still counting the cost.

My own village had a three day power cut while some households waited almost a week to be reconnected.

There was also widespread and extensive damage to our natural environment. It was heart breaking to see 250 year old trees that had survived the industrial revolution and two world wars destroyed by the storm.

Energy network staff braved the elements and worked around the clock to restore power. They went above and beyond, despite terrible conditions and we should be grateful to them.

Scottish and Southern Electricity Networks said Storm Arwen was a “once in a generation event” but that may not be the case for long.

Across the world, these extreme and unpredictable weather events are becoming more common as our climate changes.

The World Meteorological Association has warned that extreme weather events are becoming “the new norm”, so we need to be prepared for the worst.

An important part of that is about ensuring timely and accurate information is available to everyone who needs it. The situation was fast-changing, but I know from experience how frustrating it was to be given confusing rolling advice for four days.

The information available on mobile phone apps for example contradicted live information that was being fed to people via call centres, creating a confusing picture which meant many householders were unable to plan ahead.

With many people facing financial hardship this Winter, the choice to abandon a home and get hotel accommodation would have been easier if they had known about available compensation.

While SSEN were keen to tell customers they would refund the cost of a pizza, the message that householders could be eligible for over £700 through the compensation schemes was missing.

With the world now at 1.2 degrees of heating, climate change has well and truly arrived.

The impacts of extreme weather can be devastating. At the same time as Storm Arwen was battering our coasts, Somalia was facing a drought, with the United Nations warning that 2.3 million are people already suffering with serious water and food shortages.

As a rich country we can bounce back. For many people around the world, their infrastructure is poor and extreme weather events claim lives, while setting back economic development and widening inequality.

As a rich country with historic responsibility for the emissions that are now wreaking havoc on the climate we also have a duty to phase out fossil fuels quickly.

I’m sure there were mixed emotions as the Longannet chimney was demolished last week, finally signalling the end of the coal age in Scotland.

We owe a debt of gratitude to the generations of workers at Longannet who made a huge contribution to keeping the lights on.

But times change and like coal, oil and gas also needs to be phased out.

But that phase out needs to be done in a way that leaves no workers behind and creates jobs for the future.

That’s why the Greens in Government have prioritised investment in a Just Transition to new low carbon industries.

I hope from the debris of Longannet, businesses like Talgo, who make electric trains, can invest and provide jobs for a fresh generation of local people.