Europe unprepared for rapidly growing climate risks, report finds | Climate crisis | The Guardianhttps://www.theguardian.com/environment/2024/mar/10/europe-unprepared-for-climate-risks-eea-reportThe report looks at how severe the climate threats are and how well prepared Europe is to deal with them. It says the most pressing risks – which are growing worse as fossil fuel pollution heats the planet – are heat stress, flash floods and river floods, the health of coastal and marine ecosystems, and the need for solidarity funds to recover from disasters.
When the researchers reassessed six of the risks for southern Europe, which they described as a “hotspot” region, they found urgent action was also needed to keep crops safe and to protect people, buildings and nature from wildfires.
There is increasing evidence of adaptation but “it’s certainly not enough”, said Robbert Biesbroek, a report author from Wageningen University, who also co-led the chapter on Europe in the latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report on adaptation.
“It’s not going quickly enough and it’s not reaching the ones that need it most,” he said. “It’s quite scary in that sense.”
The report also warns of “cascading and compounding” risks, which it says current stress tests in the financial sector are likely to underestimate. Hot weather will dry out southern Europe, for instance, killing crops and shrinking water supplies, but will also harden soils, making flash floods more likely, and dry out vegetation, meaning wildfires can spread faster
Europe is not prepared for rapidly growing climate riskshttps://www.eea.europa.eu/en/newsroom/news/europe-is-not-prepared-for