Pan European Assessment of Weather Driven Natural Risks

The last couple of decades have experienced a significant increase of impacts of extreme weather events in the EU. There are several causes for this trend. From one side, the increased frequency of extreme events is due to on-going climate transformations. From the other side, uncontrolled developments have originated an increased exposure of assets. The EC has recognised the importance of the natural hazards subject for the protection of the environment and the citizens and for the harmonised growth of the European territory. The JRC is active in the field of risk and vulnerability analysis for weather-driven hazards. The work aims to contribute to the understanding of territorial features linked to extreme events (focus on floods, forest fires, droughts and heat-waves) and to propose solutions and policy-options for sustainable regional development in Europe. The analysis of impacts from weather driven extreme events is centred on the concept of ‘risk’, which is defined as the resulting combination of hazard, exposure and vulnerability. The development of methods for the evaluation of adaptation strategies is based on an integrated modelling concept.JRC.H.7-Land management and natural hazard