Previously in ClimateChangePost
In the Czech Republic, the onset of the bark beetle outbreak triggered by drought led to a sharp increase of salvage logging since 2016, and to one billion Euro of damage in agriculture in 2018.
Global warming will change the tree species composition of European forests towards trees that store less carbon. This may turn these forests into a carbon source and thus reinforce global warming.
In Central Europe heat waves will probably occur twice as often in the coming decades compared with previous decades. For the end of this century 2-4 heat waves are expected per summer.
The general future trend for Europe is an increase of mean precipitation in northern Europe, and a decrease in the south. But what about Central Europe, the transition zone?
The number and intensity of droughts are increasing in parts of Central Europe, not due to a decrease in precipitation, but due to an increase in evaporation under higher temperatures.
In recent decades, both several large-scale flood and severe flash floods resulting from extreme short-term (sub-daily) precipitation have affected Central Europe.
In the Carpathian Region, heat wave events have become more frequent, longer, more severe and intense over the period 1961 - 2010, in particular in summer