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Summer time broke international warmth data for the second straight 12 months, scientists have confirmed — placing 2024 firmly on observe to be the hottest year in recorded history.
The interval between June and August — summer season within the Northern Hemisphere — was the world’s hottest such interval since data started in 1940, in response to knowledge printed Friday by Copernicus, Europe’s local weather change service.
This summer season was 0.69 levels Celsius hotter than the 1991 to 2020 common, edging previous the earlier document set last summer by 0.03 levels, Copernicus discovered.
It’s the newest in a slew of world warmth data to fall however won’t be the final, scientists warn, as people proceed to pump out planet-heating fossil fuels and drive up international temperatures.
The impacts, and the toll on human well being and lives, have been clear, as nations the world over endured brutal summer season temperatures, fueling deadly heat waves, record-breaking wildfires and destructive storms.
Even within the Southern Hemisphere’s winter, warmth has been excessive.
Final month, Australia broke its nationwide document for the most well liked August day, clocking a temperature of 41.6 levels Celsius (106.9 Fahrenheit). In the meantime, temperatures in components of Antarctica climbed 50 degrees Fahrenheit above regular in July.
The Copernicus knowledge confirms what appeared seemingly after the planet skilled its hottest June on document, adopted in July by its two hottest single days on record.
Summer time was capped off by the joint-hottest August on document, Copernicus confirmed Friday.
With a mean temperature of 16.82 levels Celsius (62.28 Fahrenheit), it was 1.51 levels Celsius hotter than a mean August within the pre-industrial period, the time earlier than people began burning giant quantities of fossil fuels.
Taken collectively, the 12 months from September 2023 to August 2024 have been the most well liked on document for any year-long interval, and 1.64 levels Celsius hotter than pre-industrial ranges, Copernicus discovered.
“This string of document temperatures is growing the chance of 2024 being the most well liked (calendar) 12 months on document,” Copernicus deputy director Samantha Burgess mentioned in a press release.
There are a variety of things that trigger international temperatures to fluctuate, together with pure local weather patterns resembling El Niño, which originates within the tropical Pacific Ocean and has a planet-warming impact, in addition to human-caused components resembling burning fossil fuels — the principle driver of the local weather disaster.
El Niño, which helped gasoline final 12 months’s document temperatures, ended in June, however scientists say its impacts don’t cease instantly.
“The document international heat this summer season is predicted given the lingering warmth from the subsiding El Niño occasion that has added to the continued heating by emissions of greenhouse gases from human actions,” mentioned Richard Allan, a local weather science professor on the College of Studying within the UK.
It’s “extraordinarily alarming” that the previous 12 months breached 1.5 levels Celsius above pre-industrial ranges, Allan instructed CNN, however mentioned it was “inevitable given the gradual tempo of motion by governments” to chop planet-heating air pollution.
Scientists have long-warned that the world needs to limit global warming to 1.5 levels above pre-industrial ranges to stave off essentially the most catastrophic impacts of local weather change.
Whereas they’re extra involved with long-term breaches — over many years reasonably than single years — the regular drumbeat of short-term breaches is an alarming indication of the place the world is headed, and what meaning for individuals’s lives.
Copernicus’ Burgess warned of a lot worse to return.
“The temperature-related excessive occasions witnessed this summer season will solely change into extra intense, with extra devastating penalties for individuals and the planet until we take pressing motion to cut back greenhouse gasoline emissions,” she mentioned.
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