Introduction

This chapter examines the EU's attempts to develop a coherent policy on adaptation to the impacts of climate change. The term ‘adaptation’, although it lacks a widely accepted definition, is taken to refer to public policies, practices and projects that moderate the damage caused by and/or exploit the opportunities associated with climate change (EEA 2007a). A wide range of policy sectors are likely to be affected, including water, agriculture, forestry, fisheries, biodiversity, insurance, transport, energy, tourism and health (EEA 2004, 2007a), all of them critically important to the long-term economic, environmental and social well-being of the EU. For example, reduced water availability, wind damage and higher temperatures are likely to have a detrimental effect on agricultural production. Increases in the frequency and intensity of extreme events such as storms and floods could cause damage to infrastructure, with knock-on impacts on the financial services and insurance sectors. Even damage outside the EU could have significant effects, reducing the supply of primary resources (COM (2007) 354 final) and/or triggering an in-flow of migrants (High Representative and European Commission 2008).

Whereas mitigation efforts have been successfully coordinated at national, European and international levels, the locus of adaptation decisions is often more local, that is among the most directly affected actors and institutions (Klein et al. 2007). In the face of considerable uncertainties surrounding the spatial and temporal incidence of future climate impacts, as well as the diversity of regional environments and national institutional arrangements, a ‘one size fits all’ approach is regarded as neither necessary nor desirable.