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The world experienced its hottest season on record, the European Union’s Earth Observatory agency reported, with scientists saying the 2023 northern hemisphere summer heat record was “not just broken, but broken”.
June to August is the hottest period on Earth since records began in 1940, according to the Copernicus Climate Change Service.
UN Secretary-General António Guterres said the planet “has just had a season of boiling” and called on global leaders to act urgently.
“Climate breakdown has already begun,” he warned. “Our climate is collapsing faster than we can respond to the extreme weather events hitting every corner of the planet.”
The global average temperature is 16.77°C, which is 0.66°C higher than the 1990-2020 average temperature. That’s 0.3C above the record set in 2019, which averaged 16.48C. Every degree of global warming has an exponential effect.
The extreme weather pattern has drawn the attention of experts who fear it could indicate accelerating global warming.
Samantha Burgess, deputy director of the Copernicus Centre, said: “In 2023, the global temperature record continues to decline, with the hottest July and June followed by the hottest August, leading to our Warmest northern summer on record since 1940.”
“The scientific evidence is overwhelming – we will continue to see more climate records and more intense and frequent extreme weather events affecting societies and ecosystems until we stop emitting greenhouse gases.”
According to Copernicus, this year is likely to be the hottest year on record, with the first eight months of the year the second-hottest, just 0.01 degrees Celsius below 2016, the hottest year to date.
In Europe, temperatures were 0.83C above average, making it the fifth-hottest summer despite deadly wildfires and floods in Greece and Spain, one of the deadliest and costliest.
“The 2023 climate record is not just broken, it’s broken,” said Mark Maslin, professor of climate at University College London.
“With record heat waves in Europe, the Americas and China, record ocean temperatures and extreme melting of Antarctic sea ice, we are now feeling the full effects of climate change.”
Copernicus said above-average rainfall was also seen across much of western Europe and Turkey, western and northeastern North America, parts of Asia, Chile and Brazil, and northwestern Australia, leading to flooding in some cases.
However, Iceland, northern Scandinavia, central Europe, much of Asia, Canada, southern North America, and much of South America experienced drier-than-average conditions that led to severe wildfires in some areas. abnormal.
Following the trend for June and July, August is estimated to be about 1.5°C warmer than the pre-industrial average from 1850 to 1900.
The global peace has already been said about climate change.
In August, Antarctic sea ice extent hit its lowest level of the year.
Friedrich Otto, senior lecturer in climate science at the Grantham Institute for Climate Change, said: “Breaking heat records has become the norm in 2023. Global warming continues because we haven’t stopped burning fossil fuels.”
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