Climate change: Last 7 years ‘warmest on record’ globally; linked to fire, flood, pollution disasters
- Countries have been blasted by a relentless assault of record-shattering weather disasters linked to global warming
- This is ‘a punch in the face to make politicians and public alike wake up to the urgency of the climate emergency’, said expert
The last seven years have been the hottest on record globally “by a clear margin”, the European Union’s climate monitoring service reported on Monday, as it raised the alarm over sharp increases in record concentrations of methane in the atmosphere.
The annual average temperature was 1.1 to 1.2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, measured between 1850 and 1900, C3S said. That was despite the cooling effect of the natural La Nina weather phenomenon.
Overall, the monitoring service found the last seven years “have been the warmest years on record by a clear margin”.
“2021 was yet another year of extreme temperatures with the hottest summer in Europe, heatwaves in the Mediterranean, not to mention the unprecedented high temperatures in North America,” said C3S Director Carlo Buontempo.
“These events are a stark reminder of the need to change our ways, take decisive and effective steps toward a sustainable society and work towards reducing net carbon emissions.”
