Climate change, impacts and vulnerability in Europe ... - MemoFin.fr

Vulnerability to climate changeresults have to be seen as a vulnerability scenario,which shows what Europe's future in the wakeof climate change may look like (based on currentknowledge and assumptions), and not as a clear-cutforecast.ESPON Climate is one of several recent EU‐fundedresearch projects that employ an integratedmethodology to assessing climate change impacts,adaptation and vulnerability, for example likeClimSAVE, RESPONSES and MEDIATION.However, these other projects are still ongoingand are scheduled to deliver their final results bythe end of 2012 and 2013, respectively. There areonly a few other studies at the European level thatattempted a cross-sectoral, integrated vulnerabilityassessment like the one presented in this chapter.As part of its Regions 2020 report, the EuropeanCommission commissioned a background paperon the challenges of climate change for Europe'sregions (Römisch, 2009). This vulnerabilityassessment was integrated into the Regions 2020background report on climate change (EC, 2008).The Regions 2020 vulnerability index differs fromthe ESPON Climate vulnerability assessment, forexample it used NUTS2 level, two climate changeand five sensitivity indicators, no adaptive capacityindicators, different weighting methods and anA2 climate scenario. Consequently the results areless robust and fine-grained, but nevertheless showsimilar overall spatial patterns in that regions inthe south and south-east of Europe are the mostvulnerable regions.A more extensive follow-up study to the Regions2020 report was performed in 2011for the EuropeanCommission (Aversano-Dearborn et al., 2011).This study analysed key challenges facing Europein regard to globalisation, demographic change,secure, sustainable and competitive energy,social polarisation and, lastly, climate change. Inregard to climate change, aggregate vulnerabilityindicators were developed (building on 12 impactand 10 adaptive capacity indicators) for agricultureand forestry, natural and semi-natural ecosystems,natural hazards and coastal threats, health andheat waves, water dependency and summertourism. These were subsequently combined in acluster analysis. However, despite its ambitiousintegrated approach, the study's results cannotbe compared with those from ESPON Climate,because (Aversano-Dearborn et al., 2011) used onlyindicators on past and current climate, that is, noclimate projections.5.3.2 Key findingsThe project's findings regarding impacts of climatechange may be grouped into impacts primarilycaused by extreme events (flooding and heat)and those caused by changes of average climateconditions. The former group consists of potentialphysical, cultural and social impacts (displayed inMap 5.3) whereas the latter consists of economic andenvironmental sub-systems that are sensitive evento creeping climatic changes (see Map 5.4). Wheninterpreting the maps below, it is important to notethat they show a combination of absolute impacts(per NUTS3 region) and relative impacts (per personor unit area). For example, regions shown with thehighest social impacts have high social impacts perperson and a large population.Potential physical impacts relate to physicalstructures such as settlements, roads, railways,airports, harbours, thermal power plants andrefineries. These structures are especially sensitiveto flood events. Consequently, the adjustment ofcoastal storm surge heights with the projectedsea‐level rise accounts for most of the high impactsin north‐western European regions bordering theAtlantic Ocean (sometimes exacerbated by fluvialand pluvial flooding). Projected increases in riverflood heights are responsible for regional 'hot spots'in Italy, Hungary and Slovenia. However, large partsof Europe may not expect significant impacts ontheir infrastructure resulting from climate change.In fact, physical structures in some central andsouthern European regions may even experienceless climate-related impacts due to decreasingprecipitation in these regions.The potential social impacts of climate changerelate to Europe's population, which is also mainlysensitive to extreme events that are driven byclimate change: coastal storm surges exacerbatedby sea-level rise, increases in river flood heights,increasing flash floods, but also increasing heatevents. Sensitivity to these changes is a matterof location, age group distribution, but also thedensity and size of urban areas that create urbanheat island (UHI) effects. Hence, the social impactpatterns again largely resemble those of physicalimpacts, because population centres are alsoconcentrations of buildings and infrastructures. Thehighest impacts are primarily flood-related and areprojected for urban agglomerations on the Belgian,Dutch and Norwegian coasts as well as the cityClimate change, impacts and vulnerability in Europe 2012217