July was the warmest month across the globe EVER recorded ‘by a very small margin’ as scientists warn climate change will continue to break heat records
- Copernicus Climate Change Service calculated it hotter than any other in history
- Average temperatures overtook those compared with a 1981-2010 benchmark
- Africa and Australia were also well above average across most of each continent
July 2019 was the warmest month across the globe ever recorded, according to data released Monday by the European Union’s satellite-based Earth observation network.
The Copernicus Climate Change Service calculated that last month surpassed any other in history – albeit only slightly.
Average temperatures overtook those compared with a 1981-2010 benchmark in Alaska, Greenland, Siberia, central Asia, Iran and large swathes of Antarctica.
Africa and Australia were also well above average across most of each continent.
Globally, July 2019 was marginally warmer – by 0.04 degrees Celsius (0.072 Fahrenheit) – than the previous record-hot month, July 2016.
New record: Average temperatures overtook those compared with a 1981-2010 benchmark in Alaska, Greenland, Siberia, central Asia, Iran and large swathes of Antarctica
WHAT IS THE COPERNICUS CLIMATE CHANGE SERVICE?
The CCC is one of six thematic information services provided by European Union. The objective is to build an EU knowledge base in support of adaptation policies for global warming.
The goal of the operational Climate Change service is to provide reliable information about the current and past state of the climate, the forecasts on a seasonal time scale, and the more likely projections in the coming decades for various scenarios of greenhouse gass emissions and other Climate Change contributors.
‘While July is usually the warmest month of the year for the globe, according to our data it also was the warmest month recorded globally, by a very small margin,’ Jean-Noel Thepaut, head of the Copernicus Climate Change Service, said in a statement.
‘With continued greenhouse gas emissions and the resulting impact on global temperatures, records will continue to be broken in the future.’
The new record is all the more notable because the 2016 record followed a strong El Nino weather event, which boosts average global temperates beyond the impact of global warming alone.
The Copernicus service is the first of the world’s major satellite-based climate monitoring networks to report average July temperatures.
The margin of increase is small enough, it noted in a press release, that other networks – such as the US government’s National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) – may report temperatures equal to or slightly below the July 2016 record.
‘Typically, there is a difference between the values provided by the global temperature datasets of various institutions, and the Copernicus difference between July 2019 and 2016 temperatures is smaller than this margin,’ the agency said in a statement.
Accurate temperature records extend into the 19th century, starting around 1880.
Now, many are using the record-breaking heat as a warning over climate change.
‘July has rewritten climate history, with dozens of new temperature records at [the] local, national and global level,’ Petteri Taalas, secretary general of the World Meteorological Organization, told The Washington Post.
‘This is not science fiction. It is the reality of climate change. It is happening now, and it will worsen in the future without urgent climate action.’
WHAT CAUSED THE SUMMER 2018 GLOBAL HEATWAVE?
There are several leading theories as to what caused the global heatwave, according to University of Reading climate scientist Professor Len Shaffrey.
1. Climate Change: Temperatures are increasing globally due to the burning of fossil fuels increasing concentrations of atmospheric carbon dioxide. The global rise in temperatures means that heatwaves are becoming more extreme. The past few years have seen some record-breaking temperatures in Europe, for example the 2015 heatwave and the 2017 ‘Lucifer’ heatwave in Central Europe. Unusually warm summer temperatures have been recorded elsewhere, for example in Canada and Japan, and climate change is very likely to have played a role here as well.
2. North Atlantic Ocean Temperatures: Temperatures over the North Atlantic Ocean can play a role in setting the position of the jet stream, which in turn has a profound impact on the weather we experience in the UK and Ireland. This summer has seen relatively warm North Atlantic Ocean temperatures in the subtropics and cold ocean temperatures to the south of Greenland. These are thought to be influencing the high pressure over Europe and pushing the jet stream further northwards.
3. La Nina: Every few years, ocean temperatures in the Tropical Pacific swing between being relatively warm (known as El Nino) and cool (La Nina). Since October last year the Tropical Pacific has been in a La Nina phase. La Nina is sometimes associated with cold winters in North Western Europe (for example the winter of 2010/11 and the recent cold spell in March 2018). However, this year’s La Nina had started to weaken around April and had almost gone by June when the current dry spell in the UK began.
4. It’s the weather: The above factors influence type of the weather get in the UK and Ireland but good or bad luck also plays a role, especially for very unusual weather such as the current hot and dry spell. This summer is no different and the hot and dry weather is partly due a combination of North Atlantic Ocean temperatures, climate change and the weather. Should weather patterns continue as they are then we might expect this summer will turn out to be as hot and dry as the extreme summer of 1976.
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