Von der Leyen Vows EU Will Stay the Course on Climate Targets

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has pledged that the European Union will hold to its climate targets, using a catalogue of this summer's extremes to warn lawmakers of what lies ahead if it does not.

Addressing the European Parliament in Strasbourg on Wednesday in her state of the European Union speech, von der Leyen said there was no doubt that "Europe can, must and will stay the course on our climate targets." The commitment drew applause in the chamber.

She described a continent that was "almost" entirely spared nothing. A peatland in Belgium's high fens, formed over centuries, burned to ash, she said, while fires spread from the mountains of Ireland to the islands of Greece and Croatia. In the Alps, glaciers are retreating further each day.

The toll she listed included 660,000 hectares burned, some 12 million tons of crops lost, and more than 35,000 additional deaths during the heat waves. Rivers including the Danube, the Rhine and the Garonne are disappearing, she said, and care homes and hospitals were dangerously overheated.

"All of this is a mere preview. These were the hottest summer months ever, but probably the coolest of the years to come," von der Leyen said. "Science is clear: Europe is warming at double the global rate."

She acknowledged that the transition is complex and that adjustments and lessons would be needed along the way, but returned to her central point: "there is no doubt Europe can, must and will stay the course on our climate targets."

The figure of 35,000 deaths is triple the estimates of excessive deaths recorded by monitoring groups in July. The heat and humidity that broke records across Europe this summer would not have been possible without climate change, according to a study by the World Weather Attribution group.