Is Portugal prepared for storms?

The Portuguese, that is, 83% of them, do not consider that the country has the capacity to face extreme weather phenomena, such as those observed in recent weeks.

By Íris Marçal, in News · 11 Feb 2026, 17:32 · 2 Comments

Credits: envato elements; Author: catolla;

According to data published by the Lusophony Barometer, a study by Ipespe, a large part of the Portuguese population considers the country insufficiently prepared to deal with calamities, including storms and other unusual weather events.

This assessment by the Portuguese people is directly linked to the "train" of storms that has plagued the country, causing various damages, including floods, fallen trees, power outages, water and traffic disruptions, and infrastructure losses.

Antonio Lavaredam, the study's responsible, a political scientist and director of Ipespe, believes that recent events explain the critical reading and negative view of the population. "When extreme phenomena repeat themselves and produce visible impacts on daily life, the perception of institutional vulnerability tends to solidify, regardless of the intentions or commitments announced," he states.

The expert concludes by issuing a warning that "citizens recognise climate risk as a structural problem, but it has not yet translated into a daily urgency. The concern exists, but remains latent, overshadowed by more immediate needs."

Huge sympathy to all that have suffered these past 2 weeks. However, most people, and certainly most European governments, recognise that climate change is a reality. Politicians certainly talk about it enough. However, year after year we see the hard evidence of climate change - Spain, Greece, Canada, Australia; this year was Portugal's turn.
At what point do governments, city authorities and others start to see that this "unpredictable" weather is predictable? We have known about climate change for more than 2 decades, surely at some point they have to just face the reality and start being proactive.
They still seem to use the 100-year flood lines as a measure, as an example, when we know that this is an outdated, useless piece of information; it is being broken weekly around the world. At what point do they say that 25% needs to be added to that measure and then measures are put in place before the flooding starts.
Billions have just been lost, in infrastructure damage, lost homes and businesses, lost productivity; I'm not even mentioning the loss of lives, livelihoods and traumatic emotions being suffered.

By Anthony Williams from Other on 12 Feb 2026, 11:56

Third world

By Paul Miller from Lisbon on 12 Feb 2026, 15:02