This Year Is Already on Track to Be the Hottest Ever Recorded
After the warmest June since records began in 1850, a new analysis concludes that there’s now an 81% chance this year will be the warmest on record.
Fans and mist sprays keep restaurant customers during extreme hot weather conditions, in Athens on July 14.
Photographer: Yorgos Karahalis/BloombergThe hottest June on record has been followed by an early July that now includes 10 of the hottest days in history. Simultaneous heat waves are suffocating the US, much of Europe and parts of Asia, while El Niño intensifies in the Pacific Ocean and the Atlantic waters off Florida hit an unprecedented 90F (32.2C). It’s already enough to put 2023 on a likely trajectory to become the warmest year since record-keeping began in the 1800s.
Since October 2019, the research nonprofit Berkeley Earth has been analyzing each month’s global temperatures and issuing predictions for the year’s ultimate rank in terms of heat. Its latest analysis, published July 11, found “a fairly high chance — above 80% at this point — that 2023 will be the warmest year on record,” says Zeke Hausfather, a Berkeley Earth climate scientist.