Impacts on infrastructure and built environment

This report provides a comprehensive assessment of future climate change impacts on infrastructure and the built environment in Europe, focusing on coastal and riverine flooding up to 2100. The analysis integrates three modeling frameworks - DIVA, GLOFRIS, and LISFLOOD - to evaluate expected damages and adaptation costs under various climate and socioeconomic scenarios as well as for three different
levels of adaptation.
While the models show some variations in damage estimates due to different methodological approaches, they demonstrate consistent trends and spatial patterns of risk across Europe. Without adaptation, both coastal and riverine flood damages are projected to increase substantially across Europe, potentially reaching hundreds of billions of euros annually by 2100. Adaptation measures could significantly reduce these impacts. For coastal flooding, optimal protection strategies could decrease
damages by up to two orders of magnitude compared to no-adaptation scenarios. For riverine flooding, retention areas and dike strengthening emerge as particularly cost-effective measures, potentially reducing Expected Annual Damages by 68-83% depending on warming levels.
These findings provide crucial input for adaptation planning at both EU and national levels, while highlighting key areas for future research, particularly in improving the representation of extreme events in long-term economic assessments and better understanding the macroeconomic implications of different adaptation strategies.