Droughts and desertification

Drought magnitude and frequency in Ireland will increase in the summer

Ireland will experience more frequent and extreme droughts. The summer of 2018 illustrates its vulnerability to drought impacts: losses in cereal yields and water tankers to meet demand.

Dryer summers and heavier rainfall: a bad combination

Over the last 100 years, the severity of droughts has increased in Europe. Not due to less precipitation, but to higher temperatures that lead to more evaporation by plants and from the soil.

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Adaptation may strongly limit Europe’s economic drought impacts with global warming

Annual damage of droughts in Europe is now €9 billion per year. Without adaptation, a 3,5 times increase at 2°C global warming is projected in 2100. With adaptation, the impact is much less.

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Extreme drought threatens the lives of millions of Afghans

Afghanistan faces the lowest level of rainfall in years. Since 2018, drought has displaced a quarter of a million people, and the numbers are rising.

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Europe’s forests are still suffering from the 2014 - 2018 multi-year drought

In the Czech Republic, the onset of the bark beetle outbreak triggered by drought led to a sharp increase of salvage logging since 2016, and to one billion Euro of damage in agriculture in 2018.

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Developed countries require larger climate anomalies for a disaster to unfold

Climate anomalies, in terms of extreme weather events, may lead to disasters. A country’s vulnerability and exposure determines how large these anomalies have to be for a disaster to unfold.

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Multiyear droughts on the rise in European river catchments

For a number of rivers, discharge regime is shifting from snowmelt to rainfall-dominated. The number of European regions affected by multiyear drought is expected to increase as a result.

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Man-made climate change has increased droughts for already 100 years

Human activities affect the worldwide risk of droughts since the beginning of the twentieth century, according to an analysis of observations, climate reconstructions and tree ring data.

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Droughts in the soil increase much less than droughts at the earth surface

Meteorological droughts will occur more often and last longer. The increase of frequency and duration of droughts in the soil root zone will be much less, a global study shows.

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Will drought events become more frequent and severe in Europe?

Current drought trends will grow stronger this century. Drought hotspots in future decades are the Mediterranean, northern and northeastern Scandinavia, southern England, and western Europe.

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Even if we reach the Paris Agreement targets, droughts will still strongly increase

At 1.5 to 2°C global warming, long-term droughts will happen 5 to 10 times more frequent in large parts of the world. This will affect two thirds of the world population.

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Drought risk increases substantially in large parts of the world, even if we do reach the goals of the Paris agreement

Even under the 1.5°C and 2°C warming targets of the Paris agreement, drought risk increases significantly in the Mediterranean, central Europe, the Amazon, and southern Africa.

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Droughts are increasing in Central Europe, but precipitation stays the same

The number and intensity of droughts are increasing in parts of Central Europe, not due to a decrease in precipitation, but due to an increase in evaporation under higher temperatures.

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What is driving future water scarcity: climate change or population growth?

The frequency of droughts will increase in the next several decades. In addition, population will grow. Both impacts have been assessed. The conclusion: climate change plays the primary role.

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Future floods and hydrological droughts in Europe under a +2°C global warming

The impacts of a +2°C global warming on extreme floods and hydrological droughts have been assessed for Europe for 1 in 10 and 1 in 100 year events.

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Accelerated dryland expansion under climate change

The global area of dryland is increasing rapidly. This was shown from data over the period 1948–2005, and seems to proceed towards the end of this century.

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Desertification in Mediterranean will extend northwards to areas currently not at risk

The larger Mediterranean Basin will have warmer and dryer climate conditions at the end of this century. Desertification in the Mediterranean region

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Human and climate impacts on the 21st century hydrological drought

Human influence can account for almost 100% of the changes in future hydrological drought in areas such as Asia, Middle East and North-Africa (Mediterranean).

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Projections of climate change impacts on floods and droughts in Germany

many German rivers may experience higher 50-year floods and more frequent occurrences of current 50-year droughts

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Global warming and 21st century drying

Projected climate changes suggest increased drying, driven primarily by increases in evapotranspiration. This will likely have significant ramifications for globally important regions

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Drought length, intensity and timing in Southern France

Temporal trends in precipitation, temperature and solar radiation southern France have resulted in drier and warmer conditions over the region but with a high spatial heterogeneity ...

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