This summer, Europe has seen devastating floods in Germany, Belgium and neighbouring countries, which left at least 209 people dead and whole villages destroyed. It has seen raging wildfires following heatwaves across much of southern Europe, with similarly catastrophic effects.
Apart from being tragic, these events have hammered home the fact that the climate crisis is already here. We in
Europe are not necessarily shielded from its impacts by our wealth and infrastructure, as we may sometimes feel when we see such disasters reported from places far from home.
It is not possible to specifically attribute any given weather event to the changing climate. What can be said with high certainty is that a climate that is heating up makes these events much more likely to occur.
We also know that this situation is unavoidably set to get worse for some time, given that the greenhouse gases being emitted now will take years to permeate through the climate system.
The recently released IPCC ‘AR6’ report includes the finding that 1.5°C of warming is expected by around the end of the decade and how much worse things get from there depends on our actions.
The report goes on to predict more extreme heatwaves, floods and storms across most of the world as the century progresses. A heatwave that used to occur once in 10 years will, at 1.5°C of warming, occur four times and be 2°C hotter. At 4°C of warming it would occur nine times and be 5°C hotter. This summer’s heatwave would be cool in comparison.
Similar results are given for heavy precipitation events. Sea level rise will likely add to the risk of floods.
It is impossible to tell how bad things will really get and when as this depends on many factors. But, at this point, it is safe to say we should be prepared to see more frequent and extreme weather events in the coming decades.
There are many options for climate-proofing when designing buildings- James Sammut
A crucial aspect in being prepared would be to ensure that our infrastructure is able to handle such events as well as possible. Building regulation is drafted with certain environmental limits in mind and these may not extend to extreme high temperatures or heavy precipitation.
Regulation could, however, be updated to enforce higher standards of climate-proofing in all new buildings and, possibly, adjustments to existing buildings.
This needs to happen as soon as possible. Once buildings are in place, it is much more difficult to retrospectively create higher levels of climate-proofing.
In Malta, buildings not yet constructed may constitute a high proportion of the building stock by the end of the next few decades. It does not pay to wait until ‘things get bad’. In any case, retrofitting will take time to be done across the whole country.
There are many options for climate-proofing when designing buildings. Among them are the ‘low-tech’ traditional methods used in the Mediterranean for centuries. These include exposure of building surfaces and orientation of buildings to limit heat intake and maximise dispersion, use of architectural elements and vegetation for shadowing and the construction of thick external walls.
There are also ‘high-tech’ options, which include sensors to optimise air conditioning and ventilation, as well as the use of materials with high thermal resistance.
To reduce the risk of flooding, surface permeability and capacity for rainwater storage can be increased.
Existing regulation could be changed to require a building’s potential for overheating and risk of flooding to be assessed at a higher benchmark.
Or new legislation could be passed to have specific climate-proofing options included at the design stage.
Whatever route is chosen, the important thing is that action is taken and soon. Otherwise, people risk being condemned to the elements.