Anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions have increased since the pre-industrial era, driven largely by economic and population growth. This rapid increase in the concentration of GHGs is primarily attributed to human activities, mainly to the use of fossil fuels, changes in land use and agricultural activities. In consequence the climate system is warming (IPCC, 2007a). The effect of the concentrations of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere have been detected throughout the climate system and are extremely likely to have been the dominant cause of the observed warming since the mid-20th century \citep{pachauri2014climate}. In Europe, the average temperature has increased contnually, with regionally and seasonally different rates of warming. The greatest warming rates have been observed in Scandinavia, especially in winter and in the Iberian Peninsula, during summer. Even under average global temperature increase limited to 2°C compared to preindustrial times, the climate in Europe is simulated to depart significantly in the next decades from today’s climate.

Since 1950, high-temperatures extremes have become more frequent and annual precipitation has increased in Northern Europe and decreased in the South. Extreme events are expected to increase in Europe, in particular, heat waves, droughts, and heavy precipitation.

Precipitation signals vary regionally and seasonally. Trends are less clear in Continental Europe, with agreement in increase in Northern Europe and decrease in Southern Europe (medium confidence; Kjellström et al., 2011). Precipitation is projected to decrease in the summer months up to southern Sweden and increase in winter (Schmidli et al., 2007), with more rain than snow in mountainous regions (Steger et al., 2013). In Northern Europe, a decrease of long-term mean snowpack (although snow-rich winters will remain) toward the end of the 21st century (Räisänen and Eklund, 2012) is projected.

Extreme sea level events are expected to increase with high confidence, mainly dominated by global mean sea level rise. Storm surges are expected to vary along the European coasts, with significant increase projected in the eastern North Sea and west UK and Ireland. Increase in extreme discharges are indicated in Finland, Denmark, Ireland, France and Rhine, Meuse and Danube basins. Although snowmelt floods may decrease, increased autumn and winter rainfall could lead to higher peak discharges in Northern Europe (Kovats et al. , 2014).

Climate change may also affect countries by changing the variability in sea levels through changes in storminess, in particular, changes in the characteristics of extra-tropical cyclones. An increase in the frequency of extra-tropical cyclones would reduce the return period of present-day storm surge events; whereas an increase in the intensity of events could increase the return period of weak events and reduce the return period of intense events. Both could potentially increase the risks associated with storm surges \citep{hallegatte2011assessing}.

As the risk of extreme sea level events increases with climate change, coastal flood risk will remain a key challenge for several European cities, port facilities and other infrastructure. With no adaptation, coastal flooding in the 2080s is projected to affect an additional 775,000 to 5, 5 million people per year in the EU27, affecting the Atlantic, Northern and Southern European regions the most. Direct costs from sea level rise without adaptation could reach €17 billion per year by 2100, with indirect costs also estimated for land-locked countries. Countries with high absolute damage costs include Netherlands, Germany, France, Belgium, Denmark, Spain, and Italy.

A disaster risk is defined by UNISDR’s definition (2017) as ‘the potential loss of life, injury, destroyed or damaged assets which could occur to a system, society or a community in a specific period of time, determined probabilistically as a function of hazard, exposure, vulnerability and capacity’. Therefore, an extreme event becomes a disaster when it has large impact on human settlements and activities. As cities grow in size and number, growth in population density and industrial development in areas subject to natural disasters increase both the probability of future disasters and the potential for mass human exposure to hazardous materials during these events. Vulnerability to disaster increases due to environmental degradation, occupation of flood plains, and inadequate maintenance of drainage infrastructures and lack of planning and land management (Poljanšek et al., 2017).

Flooding and heavy rainfall in urban areas may lead to contamination of water with chemicals, heavy metals or other hazardous substances (Santato, Bender & Schaller, 2013).Especially on coastal areas, sea level rise is projected to increase coastal and river floods. Coastal communities are generally highly vulnerable to climate change threats, due to the high density of people and built infrastructure (Kovatz, 2014) and geographical limits to adaptation (Jäger et al., 2014).

Therefore, adaptation and mitigation strategies are necessary for reducing and managing the risks of climate change. Without additional mitigation efforts beyond those in place today, global warming will lead to a high risk of severe, wide-spread and irreversible impacts globally. Mitigation involves some level of co-benefits and of risks due to adverse side effects, but these risks do not involve the same possibility of severe, widespread and irreversible impacts as risks from climate change, increasing the benefits from near-term mitigation efforts.

Adaptation and mitigation responses are underpinned by common enabling factors, which include effective institutions and governance, innovation and investments in environmentally sound technologies and infrastructure, sustainable livelihoods and behavioral and lifestyle choices.

Effective decision-making to limit climate change and its effects can be informed by a wide range of analytical approaches for evaluating expected risks and benefits, recognizing the importance of governance, ethical dimensions, equity, value judgements, economic assessments and diverse perceptions and responses to risk and uncertainty.

Every step taken with regards to climate policy and management should take into account how to adapt to the adverse effects that climate change model predictions expect to be occurring in the near and far future. Therefore, measures looking to enhance adaptation capacities to climate change are imperatively needed in order to guarantee future water supply, water sanitation, environmental restoration and conservation, and the management of extreme events \citep*{manez2014prioritisation}.