climate change

A team of researchers in Germany has analyzed various factors to estimate the potential annual forest area burned in Europe by the end of the century. According to their findings, in a low-emissions scenario, the area burned would increase by 39%, while it could almost triple in a high-emissions scenario. However, improvements in fire management have the potential to significantly limit these projections. The authors, who published their work in the journal Global Change Biology, point out that “while reducing emissions is essential to lessening the impact of fires, the results also show that improvements in prevention, early detection, and firefighting play a key role in helping to reduce the extent of the affected area."

An international team has analyzed sea surface temperatures in the Atlantic Ocean and at various points in the Mediterranean Sea. The analysis, published by World Weather Attribution (WWA), shows that this year's temperatures have been extraordinary, both in their intensity and how early they have reached such magnitude. This behavior is not only having an ecological impact on marine life, the authors state, but could also exacerbate potentially destructive regional climate events like those that occurred in Valencia in 2024.

Extreme heat is intensifying due to climate change – heat whose hourly fluctuations are not captured by traditional daily temperature indicators. Research published in Nature Climate Change has analysed global hourly data from 1981 to 2023, alongside climate projections through to the end of the 21st century. More than 80 per cent of the world’s land surface showed an increase in heat. Under a high-emissions scenario, the authors predict that, for the period 2070–2099, each hot day could include more than four hours of additional high temperatures compared with current levels (2001–2023). They also predict that non-hot days could see a further three hours of high temperatures, which would likely go undetected by daily measurements. Low- and middle-income countries are the hardest hit, bearing more than three-quarters of current and future heat exposure.

Next Monday, 17 August, COP17 on desertification gets underway in Ulaanbaatar (Mongolia). This is the first of three environmental summits to be held this year. The next event will be in Yerevan (Armenia), where the COP17 on biodiversity will be held from 19 to 30 October, and the year will conclude with the COP31 on climate change, which will take place in Antalya (Turkey) from 9 to 20 November and will be co-chaired by Australia. Why has there been no proposal for a single summit encompassing all three? Would a climate summit held every two years, like those on biodiversity and desertification, be more appropriate? With the United States out of the picture, who is leading them? To answer these and other questions, SMC Spain organised a briefing session with experts who have extensive experience of this type of summit.

Western Europe experienced its hottest June–July on record, according to data from the Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S). July saw the third and fourth heatwaves since May, marking an exceptional spell of extreme heat this summer. Across much of the region, the drought observed in May and June also persisted and intensified, with exceptionally low rainfall and soil moisture in France, Spain, parts of Germany and the United Kingdom. These hot and dry conditions in Western Europe led to the spread and intensification of last month’s extreme wildfires in countries such as Spain and France, according to the report.

One of the main strategies for mitigating CO₂ emissions is the electrification of vehicles. Although taking vehicles that are still in good condition off the road has an environmental impact, a study published in the journal Science has shown that replacing them with battery electric vehicles brings long-term benefits, even when taking into account the emissions resulting from their manufacture. To address this issue, the authors estimated the life-cycle CO₂ emissions associated with keeping a combustion-engine vehicle in use, compared with scrapping it early and replacing it with an electric vehicle. The results show that the carbon footprint of manufacturing the new vehicle is reduced, as electric cars emit only a third of the greenhouse gases produced by combustion-engine vehicles.

Human-induced climate change has made the ‘extreme’ weather conditions that fuelled the recent wildfires at least twice as likely in France and 20 times as likely in Spain, according to a new analysis by World Weather Attribution (WWA). The team analysed historical weather observations and used the Daily Severity Index (DSR), which incorporates heat, drought and wind conditions and reflects the difficulty of extinguishing a fire. The researchers examined the seven-day period with the highest DSR in south-western France and central Spain, where the fires occurred, and compared it with simulations of a pre-industrial climate. According to the study, under current climate conditions, events of this intensity are projected to occur once every 20 years in south-western France and once every six years in central Spain.

In some areas of Spain and France, the intensity of weather conditions that favour wildfires — heat, drought and wind — increased by up to 50 per cent between 2016 and 2025, compared with the period between 1981 and 2010. This is one of the conclusions of a study carried out by a team including Spanish researchers, which analysed national records of forest fires in southern Europe – Spain, Portugal, France, Italy and Greece – alongside meteorological and climatic data from 1981 to 2025. The data, published in Scientific Reports, show that the number of days with conditions conducive to fires also increased in some areas of these countries. However, the annual number of fires over the last decade was 40 per cent lower than in the 1981–2010 period in all countries – a decline which, according to the authors, is consistent with a reduction in fires caused by humans, driven by stricter regulations.

The fire in Ávila, which merged with the one in the south-western mountains of Madrid last Saturday and spread to the province of Toledo, remains unstabilised, although it is under control in some areas. Wind gusts of up to 30 km/h will complicate fire-fighting efforts on Monday, according to the Madrid 112 Safety and Emergency Agency. The fire in Ávila is now the largest in Spain’s recent history. Meanwhile, the fire that broke out on Saturday in La Vall d’Uixó (Castellón), which has spread into the Sierra de Espadán Natural Park, has not yet been stabilised either. In total, around 100,000 people have been evacuated or are under lockdown across all the fire fronts.

Early this morning, the Minister of Interior, Fernando Grande-Marlaska, declared a state of emergency of national interest in the Community of Madrid and the province of Ávila due to the forest fires in Villa del Prado, San Martín de Valdeiglesias and Burgohondo. According to Carlos Novillo, the Regional Minister for the Environment, Agriculture and the Interior of the Community of Madrid, the fires were beyond the capacity of the fire services to extinguish and posed a serious threat to the population. The Madrid 112 Security and Emergency Agency has reported that, although the night-time firefighting efforts have been effective, the fires have still not been contained or brought under control. More than 10,000 people remain evacuated.