Over 1 million hectares burned across the European Union in 2025, a record-breaking wildfire season.

Omissions

• The Copernicus ESOTC figure of 1,034,552 hectares refers to 'Europe as a whole' (a broader geographic scope than the EU-27); the EU-specific figure from Copernicus EMS is 1,079,538 hectares across 25 Member States. Both figures support the 'over 1 million hectares' claim.
• The specific number of EU Civil Protection Mechanism activations in 2025 (described as 'unprecedented'/'record' in the claim) could not be extracted in detail from the sources retrieved, although the European Commission's news release is titled 'Record number of wildfires in 2025 calls for stronger EU action'.
• The European Commission article confirming the figure was published on 2026-03-31, before the session date of 2026-07-08, so the MEP could have known it.

Sources

• PrimaryCopernicus Climate Change Service — European State of the Climate 2025, WildfiresEurope as a whole saw a new record for burnt areas in 2025, at 1,034,552 hectares, surpassing the previous record of around 988,524 hectares set in 2017.
• PrimaryEuropean Commission — DG European Civil Protection and Humanitarian Aid Operations (news release)The European Union experienced its most devastating wildfire season on record in 2025, with over 1 million hectares of land burnt – an area ...
• PrimaryEuropean Commission — DG European Civil Protection and Humanitarian Aid Operations (Wildfires thematic page)The wildfire season was well above average, with a cumulative burnt area in the European Union of more than 1 million hectares, according to the ...
• SecondaryEU Agency for the Space Programme / Copernicus Emergency Management Service (Observer article)The 2025 fire season was the most severe ever documented in the EU, with a total of 1,079,538 hectares burnt across 25 EU Member States, nearly ...