Eurostar 55C trains show how Europe is preparing for extreme heat

Eurostar 55C trains are the latest sign that Europe’s infrastructure is being redesigned for a hotter climate. For everyday investors, the issue is bigger than travel delays: heat can raise maintenance costs, disrupt transport networks and force companies and governments to spend more on resilience.

The high-speed rail operator said it will equip a new fleet of as many as 50 Celestia trains with air conditioning systems built to work in temperatures up to 55 degrees Celsius, or 131 degrees Fahrenheit, according to a Eurostar spokesperson who spoke to CNBC by email. The trains are expected to enter service in 2031 and operate into the 2060s.

Eurostar had previously planned for trains able to run in heat of up to 45 degrees Celsius, CNBC reported. Recent heat waves across Europe led the company to raise that design threshold.

How is Europe adapting to extreme heat?

Extreme heat stresses infrastructure because many roads, rails, runways and power systems were built around older climate assumptions. When temperatures exceed those design limits, metal can expand, asphalt can soften, equipment can fail and workers may face unsafe conditions.

In Norway, heat has pushed asphalt temperatures at Oslo Airport close to 52 degrees Celsius, CNBC reported. Staff at the Avinor-operated airport said fire crews used about 13,000 liters of water per cooling round to protect aircraft stands and taxiways, with the process repeated hourly during the hottest periods.

In Sweden, Stockholm public transport operator SL has painted railway tracks white to lower the risk of heat-driven problems including track displacement and buckling, also known as “sun kinks.” Similar track-painting methods have been used on vulnerable rail sections in Spain and Italy, according to CNBC.

The pressure is not limited to transport. Wildfires in France and Spain forced more than 330,000 people to evacuate in the past week, while both countries prepared for a fourth heat wave of the summer, CNBC reported.

Scientists have warned that climate change is making extreme weather more frequent and more intense. The burning of fossil fuels such as coal, oil and gas is the main driver of climate change, according to the United Nations.

Jan Rosenow, professor of energy and climate policy at the University of Oxford, said in a July 28 LinkedIn post that climate scientists had warned for decades that severe weather would become more common and damaging. Rosenow wrote that “adaptation alone is not a viable strategy” after the extreme fires.

What does climate risk mean for companies?

The European Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Service says Europe has warmed at twice the global average rate since the 1980s. James Brennan, director of climate risk modelling at Climate X, told CNBC that extreme heat days could double or triple across central Europe by 2050 under a high-emissions scenario used by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

Brennan said areas that now see five to 10 extreme heat days a year could see 20 to 30 days a year within one generation. Southern Europe faces the toughest outlook, with parts of the Iberian Peninsula, southern Italy and Greece projected to exceed 40 to 55 extreme heat days annually, he told CNBC.

A European Commission spokesperson told CNBC that the Commission will soon present an integrated framework for climate resilience and risk management. The spokesperson said policy on energy, infrastructure, transport and health needs to account for the climate conditions those systems will face.

Lena Fuldauer, head of resilience and business development at Allianz Risk Consulting, described extreme heat as a “quiet catastrophe” for businesses. She told CNBC that companies can face equipment failures, lower operational efficiency, higher maintenance, downtime, supply chain disruption, power-grid strain and workforce impacts during severe heat.

Fuldauer said recent Nature Science research found that nearly half of 854 European cities broke or came close to all-time heat-stress records during the June 2026 heat wave, with a peak of 48 degrees Celsius at Casteltermini, Italy. She added that insurers cannot solve the problem alone and need to work with governments and international organizations on scalable responses.

This story draws on original reporting from CNBC.