Few now doubt that the climate is changing. For Central Europe we can expect a rise in average temperature, more heat waves and drought in summer, milder, wetter winters, more winter storms and more frequent extreme weather conditions throughout the year. So what impacts will all these changes bring? If we take just one of these phenomena – heat waves – the summer of 2003 gave us in Europe a glimpse of what’s in store. The problems range from disturbed sleep, because of the hot nights, to a higher incidence of death from heat exhaustion. France was particularly badly hit that summer, with an estimated 35,000 deaths directly associated with the heat wave. The people most affected were those living on the top floors of buildings and those in older, poorly insulated houses; the number of complaints soared from office employees struggling with strong solar radiation and heat overload. Analysing extreme weather conditions (heat waves, storms, torrential rain) that occur now is of great value in anticipating future consequences, and more importantly, in developing appropriate courses of action.