Study: Climate costs of up to 900 billion euros by 2050 possible

According to a recent study, climate change could cost Germany up to 900 billion euros by the middle of the century. This is the result of a study presented today in Berlin by the Federal Ministries for the Environment, Economics and Climate Protection.

In the paper entitled “Costs from the consequences of climate change in Germany”, the Institute for Ecological Economic Research (IÖW), the Society for Economic Structural Research (GWS) and Prognos AG run through various scenarios for the period from 2022 to 2050, which differ in their intensity vary depending on the extent of global warming. In the best case, costs of 280 billion euros would arise in this period. The results are not to be understood as a prediction, but are intended to give an impression of what could happen under certain assumptions.

High costs due to extreme events

According to the models, the average annual costs of extreme events such as heat and flooding over the last 20 years would increase by a factor of one and a half to five times each year up to 2050. For the year 2050, that would mean a loss of 0.6 to 1.8 percent in gross domestic product. This would mean that the economy would shrink even in the best-case scenario if no measures are taken to adapt to global warming. Measures to adapt, such as more green in cities, could therefore reduce the purely economic costs, measured as a loss in economic output, by 60 to 100 percent.

At the same time, according to the authors, the determined values ​​represent lower limits, since not all consequences of climate change can be measured in terms of costs and represented in the model. Added to this are, for example, the loss of quality of life and biodiversity as well as deaths. “It is therefore to be expected that the costs of climate change may be significantly higher than those determined by the scenarios in the model context,” the study says.