Internal displacement due to extreme weather

Extreme weather events may force people to leave their homes and seek temporary or permanent relocation within the same country. This is known as internal displacement.

Between 2008 and 2023, in the EU-27 countries, nearly 413,000 people were internally displaced by wildfires; over 317,000 by floods; and more than 106,000 by storms. Considering the EEA-38 countries, over 464,000 people were displaced by floods; nearly 415,000 by wildfires and almost 113,000 by storms. 

The countries home to the highest number of people internally displaced between 2008 and 2023 in Europe due to floods, wildfires and storms are Greece (over 213,000), followed by France (more than 119,000) and Spain (nearly 153,000).  

Across the EU-38 countries, the years 2023, 2021 and 2014 saw the highest number of internally displaced people (227,000; 166,500; and 157,500, respectively). 

The number of internally displaced people shows associations with economic losses and damages associated with extreme weather events; both were the highest in 2021 and 2023. In contrast, there is no association between the number of fatalities due to wildfires or floods and the number of people internally displaced by those events.  

This dashboard presents data from the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre on internal displacements from wildfires, storms, and floods for EEA-38 countries.

Data: IDMC. Available from: https://www.internal-displacement.org/database/displacement-data/