The heat wave that has just swept across all of Europe is just a small taste of an increasingly palpable reality. According to calculations by AXA Climate, Madrid is facing a climate scenario without recent precedent: if CO2 emissions continue on their current trajectory, maximum temperatures could rise by between 5.2 and 5.5 degrees by 2050, bringing the city’s climate closer to that of Marrakech today. That rise would not only mean longer and more unbearable summers but would also have a direct impact on the economy, public health, and water resources —which could reduce Madrid’s per capita GDP by up to 16.4% due solely to the effect of heat on economic activity.
The report *Caring for the Present, Protecting the Future: Climate Adaptation in the City of Madrid*, prepared by AXA Climate and presented by the AXA Foundation, identifies extreme heat as the main risk facing the capital in the coming decades. If the current trend continues, the city could experience more than two months a year with a heat index above 33 degrees, with heat waves lasting twice as long as they do now: 55 more days of very high temperatures and 62 additional hot nights each year.
That heat would be more than just a summer nuisance. The study warns that it increases the risk of workplace accidents by about 17%, to the point that a 4-degree rise could result in the loss of half a workday per week for each exposed worker, and estimates that Spain could lose some 7,700 jobs by 2030 due to the drop in productivity associated with extreme heat.
A very high economic and human cost
In economic terms, AXA Climate estimates the potential loss of GDP per capita in the Community of Madrid at up to 16.4%, attributable solely to the impact of heat on economic activity. Europe is the continent warming the fastest, with an average increase of 2.5 degrees, and Spain has already seen temperature increases of nearly 1.7 degrees and more than 20,000 million euros in losses linked to climate risks over the past decade.
The human toll is no less significant: in an extreme scenario, and if no additional adaptation policies are implemented, the city of Madrid could see up to 68,000 additional deaths by 2050 linked to extreme heat. The report’s author emphasizes, however, that this figure could be reduced by nearly fourteen times through effective adaptation measures, making political and urban action a decisive factor.
Water at the Limit: Water Stress and Reservoirs at Risk
The report also focuses on water. Madrid is already experiencing water stress, and forecasts indicate that the situation will worsen: rainfall is decreasing, and what little rain falls is concentrated in more irregular episodes, making it difficult to replenish key reservoirs such as Valmayor and El Atazar.
If the current trend continues, demand could rise from three times the available supply—as it is now—to as much as 4.5 times that amount by 2050, reducing the supply system’s safety margin to a minimum. Furthermore, the report warns that this pressure is concentrated primarily between July and October, making Madrid particularly vulnerable to prolonged periods of water scarcity in the height of summer and early fall.
Rarer, but more dangerous rains
Paradoxically, while water is scarce on an annual basis, when it does rain, it falls with greater intensity. The study notes that rainfall will be less frequent but more intense and concentrated, which will dramatically increase the risk of flash floods and extreme weather events. Through 2050, Madrid will remain particularly vulnerable to urban flooding caused by torrential rains that overwhelm the sewer system in a matter of minutes, and, to a lesser extent, to river overflows such as those of the Manzanares, Jarama, Guadarrama, Henares, and Alberche.
This combination of longer droughts, reservoirs with less storage capacity, and more violent downpours places the city in a “water roller coaster” scenario, in which water management—from domestic consumption to the design of green infrastructure—becomes critical to minimizing damage.
The study is based on AXA’s own climate indicators, validated by the IPCC and refined at the local level using downscaling techniques, which lends credibility to the projections; however, like any forecast, they depend on how emissions and policies actually evolve in the coming years.
