“Climate Change: Extreme Weather in Southern Europe Adds to Drought Woes”

From the driest month of April ever measured to unprecedented downpours. Spain, like Italy last week, is experiencing extreme weather. But those cloudbursts have not solved the drought problems. And because of climate change, southern European countries can increasingly expect this extreme weather in the future, experts say.

Rain after drought sounds like good news, but with the force with which it came down from the sky in southeastern Spain in recent days, it is not. “It comes too late and not in the right way,” says Marc Bierkens, professor of geographic hydrology at Utrecht University in conversation with News hour.

“The soils are dry and the rivers are low. Due to the enormous intensity of the rain that you are seeing now, the soil cannot absorb it and you get flooding.”

In northern Italy, extreme rainfall last week even led to the worst flooding in a hundred years. At least 36,600 people have been evacuated and vast areas of the Emilia-Romagna region are still under water.

And Spain has also been hit by severe weather in recent days, after a long period of drought. On Tuesday, more rain fell in a day in some places in the country than in the past six months.

It was to be expected that it would rain heavily in Spain after the dry period, according to Bierkens. “When the atmosphere warms, it can absorb more moisture. When it starts to rain, it rains very hard.”

Fellow hydrologist at TU Delft Miriam Coenders adds that the dry soil ensures that the water is not retained. “Things go wrong when the subsoil is dry and torrential rain comes over it. The water cannot enter the ground, so rivers cannot handle the amount.”

In Catalonia, Spain, it is so dry that an ancient church has literally surfaced. Normally only the tower protrudes above the water of the reservoir. It leads to a new kind of visitor: the ‘drought tourist’.

An extreme weather phenomenon such as the recent heavy rain showers in both Italy and Spain cannot be directly linked to climate change, says Bierkens. “But we do know that these types of events are more common under climate change.”

Coenders. “There is increasing evidence that as the temperature goes up, more water evaporates and then you get more of these extremes in both the dry and wet sides.”

Although rain was more than welcome after the dry start of spring, recent downpours have not solved the drought problem in southern Europe, say both experts. Bierkens: “Because the soil does not absorb the water, it disappears into the sea. And from next month it is usually ready again. Then it usually doesn’t rain in Spain until the winter months.”

“There won’t be much rain anymore,” adds Coenders. “And because of the rain that has now fallen, the reservoirs will not immediately fill up again. The starting position for southern Europe is now very bad.”

The extreme weather is disastrous for farmers. The grain harvest of farmer Josep Pregonas failed because of the drought. “I’ve never experienced like this year. I’ve cried a lot about it. You can only hope that it will get better in the coming years.”

It is impossible to predict whether it will get better, but that Spain will continue to deal with drought is a certainty, says Bierkens: “Southern Europe is really one of the hotspots in terms of drought on a global scale. This is due to the long, dry summers, so there is less chance of recovery.”

The Spanish government announced last week that it would release 2.2 billion euros for an anti-drought plan. More than 600 million of that goes to Spanish farmers.

Both Bierkens and Coenders think that growing other crops could be a solution for farmers. Bierkens: “Think of olives instead of wheat.”

For the long term, it is important to better retain the water that is there, says Coenders: “You can make reservoirs larger or prevent evaporation. In California and Israel, for example, reservoirs are covered with floating balls, so that less water evaporates.”