More than 3 billion in damages in Europe. In the first two months of the season fire, almost half a million hectares went up in smoke, with a Economic cost of 3,1 billion euros for the five most affected Eurozone countries alone, including Portugal, Greece and RomaniaThis figure exceeds by far the estimates of the European Commission, which foresee an average annual impact of 2,5 billion euros for the entire EU.
The brings it back Financial Times whose estimates are based on the methodology used by the Commission and on the calculations of the French government, and represent the so-called “restoration” cost To restore burned areas to their previous state, a way to quantify their economic value. The average cost per hectare for reforestation and maintenance varies from country to country, depending on the type of land cover and the age of the forest. The overall impact will ultimately be much higher. Insurers, families, and businesses are still calculating the costs of property and crop damage and disruptions to tourism during the height of summer. Other costs will emerge over time, such as the increase in insurance premiums or the non-insurability of goods, the decrease in the number of visitors and the need for invest large sums in fire-fighting equipment.
In parallel, the costs of drought have yet to fully manifest themselves, as the drop in water levels in the Reindeer and Danubio is causing disruptions in the flow of goods and production cuts. German chemical companies such as Basf, Covestro ed Evonik They have factories concentrated along the Rhine. The historic lows of the Danube threaten to cause the closure of the Hungarian nuclear power plant, which supplies nearly half of the country's electricity. Romania has also been forced to shut down one of its two reactors. Cernavoda nuclear power plantBoth draw cooling water from the river.
Sarah Meier, a climate economics expert at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) in Zurich, said the true economic cost of the wildfires alone could be more than triple the annual average of 2,1 billion euros of lost GDP, according to his calculations, due to forest fires in Portugal, Spain, Italy and Greece between 2011 and 2018. “If the fires were to reach the cities, the damage would be much greater,” he said.
