Original PSI article, October 2025
Disasters expose weak warning systems. Spain’s recent back-to-back floods demonstrate why Early Warning Systems (EWS) must move from policy promises to legal guarantees.
When torrential rains lashed eastern Spain and Ibiza this week, many feared a replay of the lethal Valencia floods of 29 October 2024. The new storms have already forced evacuations and stoked public anxiety, proof that extreme weather is no longer exceptional but recurring.
The recurrence highlights a particular failing: In Valencia in 2024, Spain’s meteorological service raised its highest-level “red” warning hours before the worst of the rain but the regional ES-Alert to mobile phones, however, went out only late that evening. The gap between forecast and public action prevented the public from receiving sufficient warning about the risks.
EWS are the alerts that turn weather forecasts into clear instructions for people on the ground. An effective EWS detects threats, translates risk into clear, multilingual advisories, and triggers pre-agreed public actions and resource deployment. Over the past 5–10 years international institutions have pushed hard to scale these systems: Better observation networks, heat-health alerts, and tools to reach the “last mile.” Yet adoption has been piecemeal. That is why last month’s technical dialogue at the UN Climate Summit matters. WMO Secretary-General Celeste Saulo urged a simple, structural fix: “We must integrate early warning systems into all Nationally Determined Contributions and national adaptation plans.” Saulo called for turning EWS from voluntary projects into statutory elements of adaptation backed by budgets, institutional roles, and measurable actions.
Why are Early Warning Systems still failing despite repeated pledges?
This proposal could be a turning point because legislating EWS solves the three choke points exposed by Valencia: It standardises risk communication, mandates preparedness and risk literacy, and creates clear triggers for action and accountability. Rather than relying on ad-hoc political decisions during a crisis, alerts would automatically cascade into pre-funded responses including; evacuation, shelters, transport, and resource releases.
Despite repeated pledges like Saulo’s to integrate EWS into every national climate plan, evidence shows that real scaling has lagged badly. According to the 2023 Global Status of Multi-Hazard Early Warning Systems (MHEWS) report from UNDRR and WMO, only 52% of countries globally report having a multi-hazard early warning system. Even in many of those, the system is weak: Fewer than half the Least Developed Countries (LDCs), and only about 40% of Small Island Developing States (SIDS), have operational systems. More alarmingly, of the 101 countries that reported having MHEWS, only about 22% have confirmed that their disaster risk information is accessible, usable, and relevant both nationally and locally.
Spain’s policy choices illustrate the trade-offs at hand. Madrid has been increasing defence allocations and negotiating a carve-out from NATO’s new 5% spending aspiration, while also explicitly routing part of its rising military capabilities toward climate-responsive dual-use capabilities, roughly €1.75 billion has been earmarked for rescue, firefighting, and disaster support within its defense plan. That blend of defense and climate spending shows one plausible path: treating resilience as a security priority, and using existing procurement flows to shore up national emergency capacity.
How many more floods, fires, and heatwaves will it take before warnings become law?
Scaling up EWS has lagged not for lack of technology, but due to weak laws, fragmented governance, and limited funding for years. Many countries have alerts on paper but no statutory obligations to act, and fewer than a third of local governments have concrete response plans. Observation gaps, outdated risk data, and inaccessible warnings leave communities exposed. Even international initiatives remain underfunded. Without clear responsibilities, oversight, and resources, forecasts rarely translate into timely action leaving populations vulnerable despite repeated climate disasters.
This article was written by Finn van der Straaten, Research Assistant at Clingendael Institute.
Photo credit: Vecteezy by Ahmad Juliyanto
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