Extreme heat supercharged by the climate crisis is sucking Europe dry in summer and intensifying the drought hitting the continent, a scientific analysis has found.
Record-breaking heatwaves meant the hot atmosphere strongly evaporated water from rivers, lakes, soils and plants – conditions made 80 times more likely by global heating in western Europe and 40 times more likely in eastern Europe, the study showed. The level of soil dryness in the west was made five times more likely by the pollution from fossil fuels in the west, and 11 times more likely in the east.
