Increased economic drought impacts in Europe with anthropogenic warming

While climate change will alter the distribution of water in time and space, quantifications of drought risk under global warming remain uncertain. Here, we show that in Europe, drought damages could strongly increase with global warming and cause a regional imbalance in future drought impacts. In the absence of climate action (4 °C in 2100 and no adaptation), annual drought losses in the European Union and United Kingdom combined are projected to rise to more than €65 billion per year compared with €9 billion per year currently, or two times larger when expressed relative to the size of the economy. Drought losses show the strongest rise in southern and western parts of Europe, where drought conditions at 4 °C could reduce regional agriculture economic output by 10%. With high warming, drought impacts will become a fraction of current impacts in northern and northeastern regions. Keeping global warming well below 2 °C would avoid most impacts in affected regions. Climate change impacts precipitation patterns, and thus the risk for drought. Damages from drought in Europe will increase with losses more than €65 billion per year in a scenario without climate mitigation; keeping warming below 2 °C avoids most impacts.