Barcelona registers highest temperature in 112 years as French nuclear reactor shuts down due to extreme heat – Europe live | World news

Europe environment correspondent

As Europe braces for the next bout of scorching weather, its lack of air conditioning has been criticised more than any other solution that governments have been slow to promote.

The emerging culture war has frustrated health experts who want more air conditioning for vulnerable groups but are wary of widespread adoption in private homes.

“Much of Europe’s investment has rightly gone into longer-term solutions like shade, insulation and cooling centres, rather than mechanical cooling,” says Hans Kluge, the head of the World Health Organization’s Europe office, which recommends nuanced adoption of air conditioning that protects those at high risk. “Both have a role.”

Efforts to adapt have brought death tolls down by 75% for the kind of heat that was considered extreme two decades ago, studies suggest, but heatwaves have in that time grown even hotter.

More than 200,000 people died from heat in Europe in the last four years, according to WHO estimates, and calls for faster change are mounting.

The record-breaking June heat is likely to yield a death toll in the thousands, if not low tens of thousands – well above the levels that trouble countries such as the US, which is also facing a historic heatwave but uses air conditioning to cool 90% of homes.

Expert advice to install air conditioning in the places where people need it most – hospitals, care homes, schools, and public transport – enjoys support from across the political spectrum. But in recent days, accusations that mainstream parties are blocking air conditioning to save the environment have come to dominate the debate in Germany and France.

An intense heatwave in Belgium caused significantly more deaths than usual in June, health authorities said, revising previous figures, the highest excess mortality ever since records began in 2000, AFP reported.

The country saw 1,747 excess deaths during the 18 June to 1 July period, the Sciensano public health institute said, up from the 1,222 estimate for 18-29 June published last week.

That was an excess mortality rate of 47 percent, it said.

Although Belgium did not officially break its temperature records for June, readings hit 35C in Brussels for several consecutive days, and climbed locally to between 38C and 40C.

A new heatwave is expected in Belgium in the coming days, with highs potentially exceeding 30C for five consecutive days starting Saturday, AFP said.

A reactor at the Golfech nuclear power plant near Toulouse has been temporarily shut down due to the ongoing heatwave, AFP reported.

“The weather conditions of the last few days have led to a significant rise in the temperature of the [river] Garonne, which is expected to reach 28C this Friday,” EDF said in its press release.

The plant’s second reactor was also shut down for maintenance, it said.

Météo-France has warned that the heatwave is set to continue until “at least 14 July,” with “a possible gradual drop in temperatures” in the coming days.

It further cautioned about expected sleep disruption due to hot nights, saying that a record-high night temperature of 30C was reported at Cap Béar (Pyrénées-Orientales) last night.

In a bit of an understatement, it said: “Night-time temperatures exceeding 30C are rare in France.”

It further added that “the risk of forest fires remained high to very high across much of the country.”

It’s currently 36C in Bordeaux, 35C in Toulouse, 34C in Rennes, and 32C in Paris.

Two-thirds of the European Union’s population may have been exposed to harmful levels of ozone pollution during last month’s record-breaking heatwave, a report exclusively shared with AFP warned Thursday.

Nearly 300 million people, including 100 million children and elderly people, faced higher-than-recommended levels of the toxic pollutant during the punishing heat in late June, according to the report from the NGO Global Witness.

The scale of this “invisible threat” highlights how “people are being forced to live through very dangerous conditions as a result of our dependence on fossil fuels,” the organisation’s senior campaigner Flossie Boyd told AFP.

Europe environment correspondent

When storm after storm battered the Mediterranean at the start of the year, drowning fields and sending water spurting from plug sockets, few people were fretting about fires.

But just four months later, the murky brown floods that swamped towns and fouled homes across western Europe have given way to angry red blazes and choking black smoke. Rampant wildfires burned 28,000 hectares (69,160 acres) in France and 50,000 hectares in Spain as of 1 July, more than double the average for that time of year, and more land has been charred by bigger fires in the week since.

Scientists have found the record-breaking heat that scorched Europe in June would have been “virtually impossible” if the climate had not been warped by burning fossil fuels, with daytime highs 10 times more likely than just two decades ago, and night-time lows 100 times more likely. Now, they are wondering if the early rains, too, contributed to the fires.

In Spain, the hot start to the summer was preceded by a rain-heavy winter and spring that helped plants grow. In much of the country, surface soil moisture was above the seasonal average from March to May, data from Copernicus shows, as well as unusually high river flow driven by an “exceptionally wet winter” in the Iberian peninsula.

But when a freak heatwave hit western Europe in late May, followed by an even more punishing one at the end of June, the extra vegetation dried up fast. Scientists have cited the combination of a wet spring and hot summer as a factor in Spain’s record-breaking wildfire season last year, finding that high vegetation water content – which at first reduced fire potential – was lost during long heatwaves, leaving behind an extensive fuel surplus.

Climate breakdown can worsen weather extremes in unexpected ways. Long periods of dry weather can make torrential downpours more likely to result in flash floods, as water runs off hard soils instead of soaking into it, while hot weather lets heavy rain pack more punch as warm air can hold more moisture.

A high temperature warning has also been issued for a dozen counties in the Republic of Ireland, PA reported.

Irish national forecaster Met Éireann said temperatures could exceed 27C during the day with overnight temperatures staying above 15C. The agency warned of water safety issues, heat stress, and uncomfortable sleeping conditions as a result.

The warning applies to Carlow, Kildare, Kilkenny, Laois, Limerick, Longford, Meath, Offaly, Tipperary, Waterford, Westmeath, and Wexford.

It will apply between 1pm on Friday and 7am on Sunday.

For what it’s worth, Heathrow Airport is reporting temperatures above 30C already – and it’s not even 11am.

The number of patients being cared for in hospital corridors or makeshift treatment areas in England increased in June, figures show, as heatwaves place an additional strain on the health service, PA reported.

Officials said the data shows that “summer is now putting the NHS under just as much pressure as winter”.

Prof Frankie Swords, NHS national medical director, said:

“What we’re seeing on the ground is really busy Mondays following weekends of football and sunshine, so please don’t delay coming forward for care when you need it, even if it’s in early hours on a weekend.”

Bea Taylor, fellow at think tank Nuffield Trust, said there is “no doubt” that heatwaves are putting additional strain on the health service.

“The health service is used to dealing with the extra pressure that winter brings each year, but climate change means hospitals are now facing multiple shocks throughout the summer months too,” she said.

France will provide emergency aid for fertiliser purchases and support domestic production, ⁠the government said on Thursday, as Middle East tensions drive up costs for farmers already struggling with ⁠low crop prices ⁠and extreme ​weather, Reuters reported.

World Weather Attribution, a network of climate scientists, said last month that Europe’s June heatwave was the “most severe ever recorded” based on a three-day forecast of average peak temperatures over the region studied, AFP reported.

Such a heatwave would have been “virtually impossible” without the influence of climate change, they said. A similar event in June 2003 would have been about 2C cooler.

An ambulance service in the south-west of England has advised people to check on elderly family members, friends and other vulnerable people as Britain battles another heatwave.

“Our message really for this week is if you’ve got friends, family or neighbours that you know that are over 65, check in with them,” Adrian South, deputy director of clinical care at the South Western ambulance service, told the BBC.

“Heat can affect people in lots of different ways and people that are older have less perception of their body temperature,” he said.

As per the UK Health and Safety Agency’s guidance issued earlier this week, parts of the country are now covered by amber heat-health alert, until 9pm on Sunday.

The regions affected are the East Midlands, West Midlands, East of England, London, South East and South West, UKHSA said.

Meanwhile, the UK Met Office said the current spell of hot weather is likely to continue into the next week, with today and tomorrow expected to be the hottest days in this heatwave with temperatures of up to 36C.

The temperatures should start very gradually going down from Sunday night, it said.

Great Britain’s energy system operator has warned that “extreme temperatures” could hit power supplies on Thursday night, as the UK entered its third heatwave of the year.

The National Energy System Operator (Neso) issued a notice overnight asking for extra supplies from power generators to cope with the added demand from households turning on fans and air conditioners to cope with the high temperatures.

After western Europe experienced the warmest June on record, we are now very much going through another heatwave in large parts of the continent, including the UK.

Barcelona registered a maximum temperature of 40.7C yesterday, the highest in 112 years of records. Some stations in Spain recorded temperatures of up to 44C.

Large parts of France are covered by orange extreme heat warnings today, with temperatures expected to hit 38C in Bordeaux and Perpignan, 37C in Nantes and 35C in Paris.

Northern Italy will also see temperatures of up to 36C in Florence and Bologna.

Over in the UK, London is expected to see another scorching day, with temperatures up to 34C.

I will bring you all the updates here. Stay cool, everyone.

It’s Thursday, 9 July 2026, it’s Jakub Krupa here, and this is Europe Live.

Good morning.