Climate change impacts and vulnerability in Europe 2016

Multi-sectoral vulnerability and risks
For eastern Europe, the variation across the SSPs is
somewhat larger, and the proportion of older people
by 2100 is projected to be between 29 % (SSP3) and
50 % (SSP1). The European Commission study agrees
with the ageing development, owing to the dynamics
between fertility, life expectancy and migration. The
EU‐28 old-aged population (65 years and older) is
projected to rise from 18 % in 2013 to 28 % in 2060,
while the group of people aged 80 years and older is
projected to become as numerous as the population
aged 0–14 years (both groups projected to be around
12 % of the total population in 2060).
Levels of urbanisation are currently at 77 % in western
and 62 % in eastern Europe, and continuous increases
are projected for both regions and across all SSPs.
Like for the ageing trend, the variation in urbanisation
across SSPs is smaller for western Europe, where
urbanisation might reach a level of 94 to 96 % in 2100,
while urbanisation in eastern Europe depends more on
the SSP (ranging from only 71 % for SSP3 to 95 % for SSP5
in 2100). A range very similar to that of eastern Europe is
projected for Turkey.
Projections of economic development are available from
three different models (see Figure 6.1), and similar
trends are projected for western and eastern Europe
across the five SSPs. All SSPs assume a steady growth
in wealth (measured as GDP per capita, adjusted for
purchasing power) and a significant reduction in the
current gap in GDP per capita between western and
eastern Europe. SSP3 assumes the slowest growth
throughout the century, whereas SSP5 at the other
extreme assumes the strongest increase in wealth,
where GDP per capita increases by factors of five
(western Europe) and seven (eastern Europe) throughout
the 21st century. For Turkey, most scenarios project a
similar trend as for eastern Europe, with a significant
growth in wealth that converges towards the wealth
levels in western Europe. In the European Commission
study of the EU‐28, the annual average GDP growth rate
is projected to remain stable at moderate levels of 1.1 to
1.5 % up to 2060.
Scenarios of adaptive capacity
Adaptive capacity is defined in the IPCC AR5 as
'the ability of systems, institutions, humans, and
other organisms to adjust to potential damage,
to take advantage of opportunities, or to respond
to consequences' of climate change (IPCC, 2014,
Annex II: Glossary). Some scholars further distinguish
between proactive and reactive forms of capacity
to adjust, and refer to these two forms as adaptive
capacity and coping capacity, respectively (Tinch et al.,
2015). Regardless of this distinction, the principal
idea is to combine the various socio-economic factors
that determine the extent to which a sector, society
or region is able to deal with the consequences of
climate change into an aggregated estimate of overall
generic capacity. Indicator-based approaches are
often employed to derive quantitative estimates (for
their pros and cons, see Section 1.4).
One of the first studies including scenarios on
the potential future development of adaptive
capacity across European regions used a composite
indicator of generic adaptive capacity based on
six determining factors: 'equity', 'knowledge',
'technology', 'infrastructure', flexibility' and 'economic
power' (the ATEAM ( 115 ) project) (Acosta et al., 2013).
Its spatial coverage was limited to 15 European
countries. Recent work from the CLIMSAVE project
has supplemented the ATEAM approach by
constructing a generic indicator of coping capacity
at the pan‐European scale based on four capitals:
'human capital', 'social capital', 'manufactured
capital' and 'financial capital' (Dunford et al., 2015;
Tinch et al., 2015). Each capital is represented by
two indicators (e.g. 'life expectancy' and 'tertiary
education' as proxies for estimating human capital).
The results for the current situation show that the
highest coping capacities are in north-western Europe
and Switzerland, while many regions in eastern and
southern Europe show low or very low coping capacity
(see Map 6.1).
The CLIMSAVE coping capacity indicator (based on
the four capitals, see previous paragraph) has also
been projected into the future, based on four socioeconomic
scenarios (see Table 6.1). For each of the
four scenarios, the direction and magnitude of change
for the four capitals of the coping capacity indicator
were quantified, together with stakeholders. The
results from this exercise show that overall coping
capacity is assumed to either improve or deteriorate
substantially towards the 2020s and even further
towards the 2050s, depending on the scenario.
However, the currently prevailing spatial distribution
across Europe of a higher capacity in central and
north-western Europe and a lower capacity in
southern and in particular in (some of) eastern
Europe is projected to prevail across all scenarios
(see Map 6.1). These general trends and patterns do
not give information about particular threats and
specific local contexts, and should therefore be used in
conjunction with hazard-, sector- and location-specific
information.
( 115 ) ATEAM: 'Advanced Terrestrial Ecosystem Analysis and Modelling'.
Climate change, impacts and vulnerability in Europe 2016 | An indicator-based report
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