Key events
France records second-hottest June since 1900, minister confirms
France registered its second-warmest June since records began in 1900, the country’s ministry for ecological transition said in comments reported by AFP.
“June 2025 has become the second hottest June since records began in 1900, behind June 2003,” said France’s minister for ecological transition Agnès Pannier-Runacher.
Spain and Portugal also reported the hottest June temperatures in history.
Morning opening: How can we live with that?
Jakub Krupa
As the European heatwave continues and expands east – with Paris, Rome, Berlin, Vienna, Prague and Warsaw all expecting temperatures in the 30s – there are growing debates about how do we adapt to deal with these temperatures.
The World Meteorological Organization, the United Nations’ weather and climate agency, said yesterday that we will have to learn to live with the new normal of extreme heatwaves, which will occur more often and be more intense as the time goes.
And the issue of how do we respond to this increasingly becomes a political issue, too, as parts of the European electorate continue to express their doubts about the cost of climate policies.
EU’s green transition chief Teresa Ribera told my colleague Sam Jones that political cowardice is hindering European efforts to face up to the effects of the climate crisis, even as the continent is pummelled by a record-breaking heatwave.
Ribera said that although the effects of the climate emergency were becoming increasingly obvious, they were still not translating into proper action as some political parties “continue to insist, quite vehemently, that climate change does not exist”, or else say that taking decisions to adapt to environmental realities is too expensive.
You can read the interview here:
I will bring you all the latest updates from across Europe on how the continent is coping with the heat, but also on these debates as the public’s attention turns to another question: how can we live with that?
Italy offers one solution as it introduces limits on outdoor work, but surely that’s not enough and doesn’t address the underlying issues. What else, then?
It’s Wednesday, 2 July 2025, it’s Jakub Krupa here, and this is Europe Live.
Good morning.