Rapid climate change: Netherlands needs to prepare for heat, drought & flooding

The Netherlands’ climate is changing rapidly and is becoming hotter, wetter, and dryer, the Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency (PBL) said in a report on Tuesday. The current climate risks already have “a major impact on our daily lives” and are “expected to only increase in the future,” the PBL said. “It is clear that increasing climate change will lead to greater risks if the Netherlands is unable to adapt to the changing climate.”

Over the past 30 years, weather record after weather record has toppled in the Netherlands and it’s happening faster than expected. For example, 2019’s heat record of over 40 degrees Celsius was only expected decades from now.

“Heat and drought affect health, have irreversible consequences for wet archeological heritage, and lead to loss of biodiversity,” the PBL said. About 100 extra people die during every heatwave. Underwater historical organic remains, such as leather or textiles from Roman times and the Middle Ages, disappear if they dry up. Extreme weather situations have also regularly led to lower agricultural yields in recent years, and damage to buildings and infrastructure.

The Netherlands needs to “urgently consider” how it plans to deal with climate risks, the PBL said. It urged the government to let climate adaption guide and direct current policy in, among others, spatial planning, housing construction, nature, and agriculture.

The agency mentioned the ambition to build 1 million homes by 2030. “Where and how do we want to build, taking into account flooding and heat? What is the status of the layout of our rural areas?” the PBL said. “What will our water system look like, taking into account water distribution, water safety, and water quality?”

“Adaption to climate change affects many policy processes and requires future-proof, structural choices,” the PBL said. Building a climate-proof society requires more than focusing on a single problem, with technical solutions like raising dikes or irrigation, it said. “It is recommended that politics and policy focus on a society that can respond resiliently to the effects of climate change, both in spatial planning and economic activities and behavior.”