New data issued by the EU’s Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) has revealed that June marked the 13th consecutive month for record heat.
It was also the 12th month in a row that the global average temperature reached or broke the 1.5°C threshold.
Carlo Buontempo, Director of the Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S), said that this is “more than a statistical oddity” and highlights a large and continuing shift in our climate.
“Even if this specific streak of extremes ends at some point, we are bound to see new records being broken as the climate continues to warm. This is inevitable, unless we stop adding GHG into the atmosphere and the oceans,” said Buontempo.
Looking ahead, as reported by Reuters, some experts have forecast that 2024 is on course to beat 2023 as the hottest year on record. Zeke Hausfather, a research scientist at Berkeley Earth, estimates that there is “an approximately 95% chance” that 2024 beats 2023 to be the warmest year since global surface temperature records began in the mid-1800s.
Indeed, the data showed that last month saw an average surface air temperature of 16.66°C, 0.67°C above the 1991-2020 average for June and 0.14°C above the previous high set in June 2023.
Meanwhile, sea surface temperature over 60°S–60°N was 20.85°C, the highest value on record for the month.
This, it was shared, is the fifteenth month in a row that the SST has been the warmest in the ERA5 data record for the respective month of the year.
The data found that European temperatures were most above average over southeast regions and Türkiye. Meanwhile, outside Europe, temperatures were most above average in eastern Canada, the western United States and Mexico, Brazil, northern Siberia, the Middle East, northern Africa and western Antarctica.
It was also found that while temperatures were below average over the eastern equatorial Pacific, indicating a developing La Niña, air temperatures over the ocean remained at “an unusually high level” over many regions.
Commenting on the findings, WMO Secretary-General Celeste Saulo said: “June witnessed widespread and prolonged heatwaves in many countries, with major impacts on all aspects of people’s life.”
This, she said, was even before the traditional peak of the northern hemisphere summer, which will “undoubtedly see more extreme heat.”
“The record sea surface temperatures are of great concern to vital marine ecosystems and they also provide energy to super-charge tropical cyclones – as we saw with Hurricane Beryl,” added Saulo.
However, the Secretary-General also noted it is “important to stress” that temporary breaches do not mean that the 1.5°C goal is “permanently lost” because this refers to long-term warming over at least two decades.