The cost of climate change on households and families in the EU

This study investigates the major climate-related risks for households in the EU by quantifying the relationship between a set of selected climate-hazards metrics, households’ income by source, and sector-specific expenditures, capturing both the climate induced cost of impacts and adaptation measures. This analysis is complemented with the assessment of mitigation policy costs for households using a mixed modelling approach. 

The report highlights the distribution of climate change costs by type (income source- and selected good/service expenditure-related) across regions (NUTS1 level) and socioeconomic characteristics of households (poor, medium income and rich households). In addition, the implications of climate change costs on income distribution and risk of poverty are analysed. The vulnerabilities of EU households highlighted in this study call for risk-specific policy measures at national and EU level and the transversality of climate change costs, especially in Southern EU, will require horizontal policy integration.