Luxembourg under water stress: what's coming and what we can learn

By Misch PautschSana Murad Switch to German for original article

With the rising temperatures of the new record-breaking summer, discussions about drought, water shortages and flooding are heating up again in Luxembourg. While politicians here are haggling, pragmatic solutions have long been tried out and successfully implemented in developing countries. What can we learn?

One per cent of the world's water must be enough to supply all of humanity. The rest is either saltwater that is difficult to utilise or is inaccessible to us, hidden in glaciers or deep in the earth. One per cent … which should actually be enough for everyone.

But it is becoming increasingly clear how many problems this fraction of global water can and will cause in the future, even in the global West. Simply put, it is often simply not where we need or want it. What is too much in one place is too little in another: in the Hanover region of Lower Saxony, private individuals who repeatedly water their lawns outside the permitted time windows during drought are threatened with a fine of 50,000 euros.

At the same time, 119 deaths are currently confirmed in Texas due to one of the increasingly frequent "floods of the century" (as of 10 July 2025) and, according to the 6th IPCC report, tropical storms appear to be becoming not only more frequent but also stronger worldwide due to climate change.

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