Economic impact of climate change in Europe

"Reducing emissions saves billions, saves lives" is a video that presents the main conclusions of Joint Research Centre's study PESETA, which investigates climate change impacts across Europe. The research integrates what is known on climate impacts in the various natural science disciplines into the economic analysis. It takes into consideration current projections on estimated CO2 emissions, the potential range of climate variations (temperature, rain, wind, solar radiation, air humidity) and the biophysical impacts (agriculture yields, river floods, and transport infrastructure losses) to assess the economic burden of potential climate scenarios. According to its conclusions, if no further action is taken and global temperature increases by 3.5°C, climate damages in the EU could amount to at least €190 billion, a net welfare loss of 1.8% of its current GDP. Several weather-related extremes could roughly double their average frequency. As a consequence, heat-related deaths could reach about 200 000, the cost of river flood damages could exceed €10 billion and 8000 km2 of forest could burn in southern Europe. The number of people affected by droughts could increase by a factor of seven and coastal damage, due to sea-level rise, could more than triple. These economic assessments are based on scenarios where the climate expected by the end of the century (2080s) occurs in the current population and economic landscape. For more information: https://ec.europa.eu/jrc/en/news/new-study-quantifies-effects-climate-change-europe