Climate change impacts and vulnerability in Europe 2016

Multi-sectoral vulnerability and risks
6.2.5 A narrative perspective
The FP7 BASE project has developed storylines of
potential socio-economic development and related
sectoral vulnerabilities up to 2050 for three different
RCP–SSP combinations and four European regions.
The scenarios were developed by project researchers
using the SSP database (see Section 6.1) on basic
socio‐economic data, which were complemented with
results from sector-based modelling and information
from case studies. Interviews with stakeholders were
used to verify salient features of the storylines (BASE
project, 2016). The following RCP–SSP combinations
were used to bring together information on
socio‐economic development and climate change:
• RCP8.5/SSP5, market-driven world;
• RCP4.5/SSP2, middle of the road;
• RCP8.5/SSP3, fragmentation.
The following regions were used for regional
aggregation:
• northern Europe and the Arctic (Estonia, Finland,
Iceland, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway, Sweden);
• north-western Europe (Belgium, Denmark, France,
Ireland, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom);
• central and eastern Europe (Austria, Bulgaria, the
Czech Republic, Germany, Hungary, Kosovo under
UNSCR 1244/99, Luxembourg, the former Yugoslav
Republic of Macedonia, Poland Romania, Serbia,
Slovakia, Switzerland);
• southern Europe and the Mediterranean (Albania,
Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Cyprus, Greece,
Italy, Malta, Montenegro, Portugal, Slovenia, Spain,
Turkey).
One common feature across regions and storylines is
urbanisation (see also Section 6.1). This implies that
an increasing number of people will be exposed to
typical urban impacts such as heat island effects, storm
water floods and flash floods (see Section 6.6). In a
market‐driven world, more assets will be exposed to
climate-related hazards and there will be increasing
demands to invest in reducing vulnerabilities.
The assumption of significant relative population
growth in a market-driven world, especially in northern
Europe and the Arctic and north-western Europe,
means that new infrastructure will be built, including
housing. The development of vulnerabilities will
depend on how the new areas accommodating the
increasing population are planned and built. In these
storylines, the central and eastern regions appear
less dynamic in terms of population and economic
growth, which means fewer changes than in the current
situation, but also relatively fewer resources to address
vulnerabilities.
The 'fragmentation' storylines are in many respects
the most problematic ones for all regions, as they
are characterised by few additional resources but
high exposure to climatic hazards owing to the
assumed RCP8.5 scenario. Major challenges will
include the management of agriculture, especially
in the Mediterranean area, which will suffer from
an increasing frequency of drought and high
temperatures. Under 'fragmentation', financial
resources are scarce and the abilities to cope with
adverse conditions are weaker; thus, vulnerability
increases relative to market-driven development, even
under the same scenario, RCP8.5.
One of the main features of progressing climate change
is that vulnerabilities will raise new challenges but also
some opportunities for both the public and private
sectors. These opportunities and challenges will play
out differently, depending on the socio-economic
pathways that set the general context. To illustrate
this, a synthesis has been made of the material
with reference to a 'fragmentation' storyline and a
'middle‐of-the-road' storyline (see Table 6.3).
The 'fragmentation' storyline illustrates a current
business-as-usual scenario: increasing emissions along
an RCP8.5 trajectory until 2050, combined with uneven
economic growth in which some areas and countries
grow rapidly, whereas others face stagnation or even
decline. Globalisation progresses unevenly and the free
movement of natural resources, technologies, capital
and people develops between some countries and
regions but not others.
The 'middle-of-the-road' storyline illustrates a scenario
that leads to a clear curbing of emissions towards an
RCP4.5 trajectory until 2050, combined with modest
economic growth that benefits most regions and
countries (although obviously with varying rates).
Globalisation is assumed to progress in a way that
facilitates free and fair movement of natural resources,
technologies, capital and people between regions and
beyond Europe.
These two storylines were chosen to illustrate the
differences between a modest progress in mitigation
and a failure to mitigate climate change. The
climate‐related challenges in the storyline assuming
rapid economic growth in combination with high
emissions (a market-driven world) would be similar
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