From the Danube to the Loire, Europe’s prime rivers — lifelines for the continent’s economy — are running low after a brutal five-month drought. After years of dry weather, scientists are warning that low-water conditions could become the norm in Europe as the climate changes.
Europe’s most severe drought in decades is hitting homes, factories, farmers and freight across the continent, as experts warn drier winters and searing summers fuelled by global heating mean water shortages will become “the new normal”.
The 2018 to 2020 European drought was the worst in more than two centuries, driven in part by uncommonly high temperatures that exacerbated dry conditions across large parts of the continent, new research finds.
