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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 2024, in the EU-27 countries, over 491,000 people were internally displaced by wildfires; over 341,000 by floods; and more than 181,000 by storms (IDMC, 2026). Considering the European Environment Agency’s (EEA) member and cooperating countries, over 520,000 people were displaced by floods; nearly 587,000 by wildfires and over 198,000 by storms.

The countries home to the highest number of people internally displaced between 2008 and 2024 due to floods, wildfires and storms are Greece (over 273,000), followed by Spain (over 177,000) and France (more than 123,000).

Across the cooperating countries, the years 2021, 2023, and 2024 saw the highest number of internally displaced people (253,000, 232,000, and 181,500, 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 2024. 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.

The dashboard presents data from the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre on internal displacements from wildfires, storms, and floods for EEA cooperating countries. Internal displacement refers to the number of forced movements of people within the borders of their country recorded during the year. Figures may include people who have been displaced more than once.

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

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This translation is generated by eTranslation, a machine translation tool provided by the European Commission.

Exclusion of liability
This translation is generated by eTranslation, a machine translation tool provided by the European Commission.