2023 confirmed as world’s hottest year on record
The year 2023 has been confirmed as the warmest on record, driven by human-caused climate change and boosted by the natural El Niño weather event.
Last year was about 1.48°C warmer than the long-term average before humans started burning large amounts of fossil fuels, the EU’s climate service says – with almost every day since July seeing a new global air temperature high for the time of year.
Sea surface temperatures have also smashed previous highs; the world’s ocean surface has been on an unbroken streak of record-breaking days since 4 May.
The Met Office reported last week that NI experienced its warmest year on record in 2023, and the UK its second warmest year on record.
This record global warmth has helped to worsen many extreme weather events across large parts of the world in 2023 – from intense heatwaves and wildfires across Canada and the US, to prolonged drought and then flooding in parts of east Africa. Many occurred on scales far beyond those seen in recent times, or at unusual points of the year.
The year 2024 could be warmer than 2023 – as some of the record ocean surface heat escapes into the atmosphere – raising the possibility that 2024 may even surpass the key 1.5°C warming threshold across the entire calendar year for the first time, according to the UK Met Office.
Photography by James Day on Unsplash