Is Europe’s transport infrastructure ready to face climate change?

Abstract. Climate extremes are intensifying in frequency and severity, posing escalating risks to Europe’s transport infrastructure. Over the past two decades, these events have caused physical damages, economic losses, user delays, and rising health emergencies. Here, we first review observed impacts of selected climate extremes on Europe’s transport network. We then present a multi-hazard analysis, designed to be intuitive and accessible for policymakers, to quantify the increasing exposure of four transport modes to river floods, heatwaves, droughts, tropical cyclones, and wildfires. We find that climate extremes are already affecting all transport modes across large parts of Europe, with billions euro worth of economic damage even for single events. For example, the 2018 Rhine River drought, which resulted in EUR 2.4 billion in economic losses in Germany. Under a medium-high emissions scenario (RCP6.0), exposure of critical European transport infrastructure to climate extremes is projected to rise, with heatwave exposure increasing up to 70 times by mid-century (2024–2075) compared to historical conditions (1954–2005). Droughts could affect 40 % of inland waterways for the first time by mid-century in this scenario. By the end of the century (2049–2100), railways and roads are projected to face up to 42 times as many wildfires compared to the historical period and exposure to river floods is projected to increase locally up to 13 times. Mitigation efforts aligned with a low-emissions scenario (RCP2.6) demonstrate clear benefits, reducing EU-mean transport mode exposure to heatwaves by 26–32 %, wildfires by 17–38 %, floods by ~20 %, and droughts by 10–20 %, in terms of relative differences, by the end of the century. Urgent action is needed to strengthen the resilience of Europe’s transport network and address emerging climate challenges. A combination of ambitious mitigation and adaptation strategies is essential to ensuring their long-term functionality in a changing climate.