{"id":1180745,"date":"2026-09-01T14:01:13","date_gmt":"2026-09-01T14:01:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/1180745\/"},"modified":"2026-09-01T14:01:13","modified_gmt":"2026-09-01T14:01:13","slug":"europes-summer-of-wildfires-puts-spotlight-on-economic-cost-of-climate-inaction-euobserver","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/1180745\/","title":{"rendered":"Europe\u2019s summer of wildfires puts spotlight on economic cost of climate inaction \u2013 EUobserver"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Tuesday (1 September) marks the deadline for EU countries to submit their draft national restoration plans under the <a href=\"https:\/\/environment.ec.europa.eu\/topics\/nature-and-biodiversity\/nature-restoration-regulation_en\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">EU Nature Restoration Law<\/a>, a key part of the EU <a href=\"https:\/\/environment.ec.europa.eu\/strategy\/biodiversity-strategy-2030_en\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Biodiversity Strategy<\/a> for 2030. So far, only six countries have done so, according to an internal European Commission <a href=\"https:\/\/reportnet.europa.eu\/public\/dataflow\/1906\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">database<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The law aims to build resilience to future threats like forest fires, food insecurity or disease outbreaks, but also to restore degraded ecosystems. But beyond environmental objectives, nature restoration is also an economic challenge. <\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Costs of inaction are visible by the year, and this time around, it has been through successive heatwaves, droughts and forest fires impossible to ignore.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cEurope doesn\u2019t need more box-ticking,\u201d said the #RestoreNature coalition in a statement.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">France and Spain have had their biggest losses yet. As of <a href=\"https:\/\/joint-research-centre.ec.europa.eu\/scientific-activities\/natural-and-man-made-hazards\/forest-fires\/current-wildfire-situation-europe_en\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">1 September<\/a>, 643,085 hectares have burnt since the start of the year.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Beyond the wildfires, <a href=\"https:\/\/euobserver.com\/226464\/europes-e70bn-annual-climate-adaptation-bill-soars-as-wildfires-rage-and-heatwave-deaths-climb\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">EU countries<\/a> faced relentless heatwaves that strained national healthcare systems, resulting in more than 35,000 excess deaths across Europe, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/environment\/2026\/aug\/25\/at-least-35000-excess-deaths-europe-back-to-back-heatwaves\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">according<\/a> to the Guardian.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">With Europe facing increasing challenges linked to climate disruption, environmental groups are urging governments to make changes.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1168\" height=\"798\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/image.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-234649\" style=\"aspect-ratio:1.4642857142857142\"  \/><\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cGovernments must deliver strong and properly resourced plans that scale up the restoration to increase Europe\u2019s resilience,\u201d said #RestoreNature.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cThe risks around us are changing. They are becoming more frequent, more complex and more severe\u201d said EU Commission president Ursula von der Leyen in a <a href=\"https:\/\/civil-protection-humanitarian-aid.ec.europa.eu\/news-stories\/news\/statement-president-von-der-leyen-following-her-visit-emergency-response-coordination-centre-2026-08-31_en\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">statement<\/a> following a visit to the emergency response coordination centre.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Tuesday (1 September) marks the deadline for EU countries to submit their draft national restoration plans under the&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1180746,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5174],"tags":[217083,2000,299,5187,224969,224966,224964,224967,224965,224968],"class_list":["post-1180745","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-eu","tag-typedefinedterm","tag-eu","tag-europe","tag-european","tag-identifier25","tag-identifier4274","tag-nameclimate","tag-namegreen-economy","tag-termcodeclimate","tag-termcodegreen-economy"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/117196153499336783","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1180745","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1180745"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1180745\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1180746"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1180745"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1180745"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1180745"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}