FACTBOX-Impacts for Europe of climate change

(Reuters) - Following are impacts of global warming for Europe outlined in a draft U.N. climate report due to be released in Brussels on April 6.

The draft, to be discussed by scientists and government experts in the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change meeting from Monday, is looking at the regional effects of warming:

EUROPE

-- The percentage of river basin areas with severe water stress is expected to increase from 19 percent to 34-36 percent by the 2070s.

-- Millions of people are likely to live in watersheds with shortages in western Europe.

-- Under scenarios of a fast rise in global temperatures, an extra 2.5 million people a year will be affected by coastal flooding by the 2080s.

-- By the 2070s, hydropower potential for Europe is expected to decline overall by 6 percent, ranging from a 20-50 percent decrease in the Mediterranean region to a 15-30 percent increase in Northern and Eastern Europe.

-- A large percentage of European flora could become vulnerable, endangered, critically endangered or extinct under a range of scenarios.

-- By 2050, crops are expected to show a northward expansion. In northern Europe, wheat yields may gain by 8 to 25 percent by 2050. But in the south, yields may range from a fall of 8 percent to a gain of 22 percent by 2050.

-- Forested area is likely to increase in the north and decrease in the south, with a redistribution of species. Forest fire risk is virtually certain to increase greatly in southern Europe.

-- Small alpine glaciers will disappear, while larger glaciers will suffer a volume reduction of between 30 to 70 percent by 2050.

-- Tourism to the Mediterranean might fall in summer and increase in spring and autumn.

-- A rapid shutdown of the Gulf Stream bringing warm waters northwards across the Atlantic to Europe -- viewed as a low probability -- could have severe impacts such as cutting crop production, more cold-related deaths, and a shift in populations south.