National climate change vulnerability and risk assessments in Europe

This report presents the first systematic review on how the 33 EEA member countries (including the 28 European Union Member States) have developed their national climate change impact, vulnerability and risk (CCIV) assessments.

The report is based on a survey that was completed by 24 of 33 EEA member countries, on the country pages of Climate-ADAPT and on other public sources of information. The first national CCIV assessment was carried out in 2005 and almost all EEA member countries have conducted at least one national CCIV assessment. The thematic coverage of national CCIV assessments is broad. The most common covered thematic areas are water and agriculture, followed by biodiversity, energy, forestry and human health.

The report also provides information on how countries used CCIV assessments in developing adaptation policies, revealing that national adaptation policy development have been the major reason for national CCIV assessments, and that multi-sectoral and sectoral national CCIV assessments have been the most important information sources for the development of national adaptation policies.

The report has also identified lessons learned, knowledge gaps in current assessments and made suggestions for further developing CCIV assessments in the future.