Building a climate‑resilient low‑carbon energy system
All parts of Europe’s energy system, from availability of energy sources to energy consumption, are potentially vulnerable to climate change and extreme weather events, according to a European Environment Agency report, published today. To secure reliable supply of clean energy, Europe’s energy system needs to adapt and become more climate resilient, the report states.
What will Europe’s environment look like in 25 years? Will we achieve our common vision of ‘living well, within the limits of our planet’? Will we be able to limit global warming and build climate-resilient cities surrounded by healthy nature? Europeans are increasingly concerned as recent European Parliament elections showed. Europe’s next generation is also calling for urgent action, but how will their will their demands for a sustainable future shape Europe’s environment and socio-economic policies? On our 25th anniversary, we are reflecting on how Europe’s environmental knowledge and policy have developed in the last 25 years and how we, the EEA together with its networks, can support efforts towards sustainability in the next 25 years.
Potential quiet areas in Europe, based upon Quietness Suitability Index (QSI) and Natura 2000 protected areas
Plastic waste remains a huge and growing problem. But what is the European Union doing to address the issue? Ioannis Bakas, the EEA’s waste prevention expert gives a brief overview of the EEA’s report on preventing plastic waste in Europe, which was published earlier this month.
Indicator Assessment
14 Jun 2019
According to different observational records of global average annual near-surface (land and ocean) temperature, the last decade (2009–2018) was 0.91 °C to 0.96 °C warmer than the pre-industrial average, which makes it the warmest decade on record. Of the 18 warmest years on record, 17 have occurred since 2000. The year 2018 was the world’s fourth warmest year on record after the years 2016, 2015 and 2017.
The average annual temperature for the European land area for the last decade (2009–2018) was between 1.6 °C and 1.7 °C above the pre-industrial level, which makes it the warmest decade on record. In Europe, 2018 was among three warmest years on record.
Climate models project further increases in global average temperature over the 21st century (for the period 2081–2100 relative to 1986–2005) of between 0.3 °C and 1.7 °C for the lowest emissions scenario (RCP2.6) and between 2.6 °C and 4.8 °C for the highest emissions scenario (RCP8.5).
All UNFCCC member countries have agreed on the long-term goal of keeping the increase in global average temperature to well below 2 °C compared with pre-industrial levels and have agreed to aim to limit the increase to 1.5 °C. For the three highest of the four RCPs, the global average temperature increase is projected to exceed 2 °C compared with pre-industrial levels by 2050.
Annual average land temperature over Europe is projected to increase by the end of this century (2071–2100 relative to 1971–2000) in the range of 1.0 °C to 4.5 °C under RCP4.5, and 2.5 °C to 5.5 °C under RCP8.5, which is more than the projected global average increase. The strongest warming is projected across north-eastern Europe and Scandinavia in winter and southern Europe in summer.
The number of warm days (those exceeding the 90th percentile threshold of a baseline period) have doubled between 1960 and 2018 across the European land area.
Europe has experienced several extreme heat waves since 2000 (2003, 2006, 2007, 2010, 2014, 2015, 2017 and 2018). Under a high emissions scenario (RCP8.5), extreme heat waves as strong as these or even stronger are projected to occur as often as every two years in the second half of the 21st century. In southern Europe, they are projected to be particularly strong.
The Multiannual Work Programme (MAWP) 2014–2020, ‘Expanding the knowledge base for policy implementation and long-term transitions’, sets out the overall objectives for the work of the European Environment Agency (EEA) and the European Environment Observation and Information Network (Eionet) in line with the provisions of the EEA/Eionet Regulation. The MAWP is delivered through annual work programmes. This Consolidated Annual Activity Report (CAAR) documents the delivery of the Annual Work Programme (AWP) 2018.
The European inventory of nationally designated protected areas holds information about designated areas and their designation types, which directly or indirectly create protected areas. This is version 17 and covers data reported until March 2019.
Data Visualization
11 Jun 2019
These maps show observed linear trends in heating degree days (left) and cooling degree days (right) over 1981–2017 for all EEA member and cooperating countries. Stippling depicts regions where the trend is statistically significant at the 5% level.
These maps show the trend in heating degree days (left) and cooling degree days (right) from 1981-2100 for all EEA member and cooperating countries, based on the median of an ensemble of 11 EURO-CORDEX simulations.
Indicator Assessment
11 Jun 2019
The annual population-weighted heating degree days (HDD) decreased by 6 % between the periods 1950–1980 and 1981–2017; the decrease during the period 1981–2017 was on average 6.5 HDDs per year. The largest decrease occurred in northern Europe and possibly in Italy.
The annual population-weighted cooling degree days (CDD) increased by 33 % between the periods 1950–1980 and 1981–2017; the increase during the period 1981–2017 was on average 0.9 HDDs per year. The largest increase occurred in southern Europe.
The observed trend in HDDs and CDDs is projected to continue throughout the 21st century. The largest absolute decreases in HDDs are expected in northern and south-eastern Europe; the largest absolute increases in CDDs are expected in southern Europe.
The decrease in HDDs in Europe is projected to be much larger than the increase in CDDs in absolute terms. However, a given change in CDDs generally has larger economic impacts than the same change in HDDs, because cooling is almost exclusively produced from electricity, whereas heating is often derived from energy carriers with lower specific costs and primary energy requirements.
The projected increase in cooling demand in southern Europe may further exacerbate peaks in electricity demand in summer. This can threaten the stability of electricity networks during summer heatwaves, unless appropriate adaptation measures are taken.
Just over 85% of bathing water sites across Europe monitored last year met the European Union’s highest ‘excellent’ and most stringent quality standards for water cleanliness, according to the latest annual European bathing water quality report. The results published today give a good indication of where the best quality bathing waters are likely to be found this summer.
GIS Map Application
06 Jun 2019
Bathing water monitoring by country. Please note: for the scales 1:5.000.001 and less detailed, data are aggregated by country. In such case, stacked bars show percentage of bathing water quality for coastal and inland waters together. Number of bathing waters within certain category is seen in pop up window which can be turned on with a click on one of the countries. For the scale range 1:5 000.000 to 1:700,001, individual bathing water sites (points) are visible instead of classified stacked charts and are coloured according to the classification of bathing water quality. Symbol size depends on the map scale (in more detailed map scales symbols are bigger). For the scales 1:700,000 and more detailed, symbol of bather in a square appears instead of points. Symbol size depends on the map scale.
Data Visualization
05 Jun 2019
This table shows which EEA member countries have national adaptation strategies and national adaptation plans in place.
The numer of years within which the peak concentrations levels could become exceeded are provided by the purple arrows, given the trend of the past 10 years of the total greenhouse gas concentration (based on IPCC, 2018)
Industrial activities are part of our modern society and give us many benefits. However industrial pollution & mercury are problems which have an impact on our health and on the environment. The EU is at the forefront in taking action to address this pollution. Did you know there is key information available on industrial emissions around where you live?
GIS Map Application
10 Oct 2018
This interactive map gives a European overview of water stress conditions. The information presented may deviate from that available in the EEA member countries and cooperating countries, particularly for those countries where data availability is insufficient in the WISE SoE – Water quantity database (WISE 3).
Data on hydro-climatic variables was aggregated from a daily to a monthly scale. Water abstraction data was taken from WISE 3 (annual resolution at the national scale), although there are large gaps in the time series. Therefore, intensive gap filling was performed on water abstraction data and proxies were used to disaggregate the data from the national to the sub-basin scale.
Information on water use was mainly modelled on the UWWTP capacities, the E-PRTR database and the Eurostat Population change dataset (online data code [demo_gind]) among others. See the methodology chapter for further explanation of gap filling, and spatial and temporal disaggregation, and the data uncertainties chapter for current data availability.
This interactive map allows users to explore changes over time in water abstraction by source, water use by sector and water stress level at sub-basin or river basin scale. The WEI+ has been estimated as the quarterly average per river basin district, for the years 1990-2015, as defined in the European catchments and rivers network system (ECRINS). The ECRINS delineation of river basin districts differs slightly from that defined by Member States under the Water Framework Directive. The Ecrins delineation is used instead of WFD because it contains geo-spatial information on Europe’s hydrographical systems with full topological information enabling flow estimation between upstream and downstream basins, as well as integration of economic data collected at NUTS or country level.
In addition to using e WISE SoE – Water quantity database, a comprehensive manual data collection was performed by accessing all open sources (Eurostat, OECD, FAO) including national statistical offices of the countries. This was done because of the temporal and spatial gaps in the data on water abstraction. Moreover, a large part of the stream flow data from LISFLOOD has also been substantially updated by the Directorate-General Joint Research Centre. Similarly, a comprehensive update with climatic parameters has been performed by the EEA based on the E-OBS dataset. Therefore, the time series of the WEI+ presented in the current version might be slightly different for some basins compared with the previous version.
