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EUROPE: More than 1,000 deaths have been attributed to the nearly week-long heatwave in Portugal and Spain so far. Temperatures in Spain have reached as high as 45.7C (114F). In France, wildfires have now spread over 11,000 hectares (27,000 acres) in the southwestern region of Gironde, and more than 14,000 people had been evacuated in mid-July.

As of today, a surface area over a fifth the size of Belgium has already been ravaged by flames this year. Worryingly, we happen to be only halfway into the "fire season". According to the European Forest Fire Information System (EFFIS), 2022 is already a record year for wildfire destruction. Between mid-January and mid-August, 1,6 million acres of land have been destroyed. The data tells us that this number is twice that of the 2006-2021 average surface, and four times the average cumulative number of fires over the same period of time.

This year’s Conference of the Parties (COP 27) will take place in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt from 7-18 November. Environment ministers from over 40 different countries already met on the 18th and 19th of July at the Petersberg Climate Dialogue in Berlin, Germany to prepare the ground for this year’s annual UN climate conference. Both loss and damage, and adaptation are set to be key issues at the forthcoming COP. The EU and other developed countries recognized the urgency of addressing this issue, in particular by strengthening existing arrangements and institutions that have demonstrated experience in supporting communities in need. Environment ministers have engaged in talks on funding arrangements to address loss and damage caused by climate-related events. This year, the most flagrant example of this is the wildfires that have been burning across Europe since the Spring as a consequence of a record succession of heatwaves across the continent.

These soaring temperatures, the consequences of which we are seeing through this never-before-seen spread of wildfires as well as other heat-related deaths, are scientifically proven to be consistent with climate change. While it is fairly common for forest fires to occur over the summer months in Mediterranean regions, their appearance in the UK and Germany for example this year is out of the ordinary. The same can also be said when it comes to the protracted nature and intensity of the fires in the "usual" regions. Furthermore, the climate crisis that we are in means that this type of event (record-breaking heatwaves, wildfires, drought,...) is much more likely to happen in the future. Surveys indicate that global warming is possibly inducing a change in regional fire dynamics that tend toward Europe being increasingly impacted, suggesting that the emerging risks that are posed by these fire-prone weather conditions could progressively lead to an inability to suppress wildfires in the coming years