Impact of strong climate change on backup energy needs in Europe.

a, Amount of energy that has to be provided by dispatchable backup generators in Germany as a function of the storage capacity Smax for the five models in the EURO-CORDEX ensemble and a strong climate change scenario (RCP8.5). Energy is given in units of the average yearly gross electricity consumption Lyear. Blue: 1970-2000 (h), Red: 2030-2060 (mc), Yellow: 2070-2100 (eoc). b, Absolute change of the average backup energy as a function of Smax in Germany. Colors are the same as in panel a. c, d, Relative change of the average backup energy needs by the end of the century with respect to the historical time frame for 29 European countries and two values of the storage capacity Smax. The color code corresponds to the average of the five models and the hatching indicates the robustness of the results. No hatching: 5/5, striped: 4/5, crossbred: 3/5 models agree on the sign of change.