SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
global temperatures
Sunday Was Earth's Hottest Day on Record
"We are now in truly uncharted territory and as the climate keeps warming, we are bound to see new records being broken in future months and years," one expert said.
Jul 23, 2024
July 21 was Earth's hottest day on record, overtaking the record set last July during the
hottest year in millennia.
The European Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) found that Sunday's average air surface temperature soared to 17.09°C , or 62.76°F, according to preliminary data. While that is only 0.1°C warmer than the previous record—set on July 6, 2023—it was nearly 0.3°C higher than the pre-2023 record, set at 16.8°C on August 13, 2016.
"What is truly staggering is how large the difference is between the temperature of the last 13 months and the previous temperature records," C3S Director Carlo Buontempo said in a statement. "We are now in truly uncharted territory and as the climate keeps warming, we are bound to see new records being broken in future months and years."
The news follows a year of shattered temperature records as El Niño combined with the climate emergency to heat air and ocean to levels well above average. While El Niño conditions ended in April, scientists still predict that 2024 could overtake 2023 as the hottest year on record.
As of June 2024, the past 13 months have all been the hottest of their kind on record. June 2024 was also the 12th month in a row to see its average temperature meet or surpass 1.5°C above preindustrial levels—the most ambitious temperature goal enshrined in the Paris agreement.
Scientists have warned that the only way to keep global temperatures from rising further is to rapidly phase out the use of oil, gas, and coal and transition to renewable energy.
"These recurring record-breaking temperatures are a scorching red flag, but it's not too late to reverse course."
Before Sunday, the last hottest day on record was July 6, 2023, which was also the fourth consecutive day to break that record. The previous record was set at 17.08°C, or 62.74°F, according to Copernicus. However, since the 2016 temperature record was first broken on July 3, 2023, 57 days in the past year have also surpassed it.
What's more, C3S found that the last 10 years have been the 10 years on record with the highest average daily temperatures.
"The difference in the highest daily average temperature between the lowest ranked of those 10 years (2015) and the previous record before 2023 (13 August 2016) was 0.2°C. The jump from the 2016 record to 2023/2024 is about 0.3°C, highlighting how substantial the warmth of 2023 and 2024," C3S said.
Record-breaking temperatures have also brought extreme weather.
On Sunday, Florida meteorologist Jeff Berardelli wrote on social media that "the most anomalously warm places were Antarctica and Western Canada where several hundred wildfires blaze, many out of control."
C3S also said that Sunday's record was in part driven by "much-above-average temperatures over large parts of Antarctica."
The warmest day on record also coincided with heatwaves in Russia, Europe, and the U.S., Reuters reported.
C3S predicted that temperatures would continue to rise in the short term.
"In the coming days, we are expecting the daily global average temperature to further increase and peak around 22 or 23 July 2024 and then go down, but with possible further fluctuations in the coming weeks," the agency said.
In the longer term, temperature trends will depend on whether policymakers can take ambitious action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and halt the destruction of natural carbon sinks.
"These recurring record-breaking temperatures are a scorching red flag, but it's not too late to reverse course," Oceana Campaign director Joseph Gordon said in a statement. "When you're on the path to destruction, the best thing you can do is turn around."
Gordon recommended one thing U.S. President Joe Biden in particular could do to stop runaway climate change.
"One of the most immediate and impactful ways to address greenhouse gas emissions is to prevent new offshore drilling in the United States," Gordon said. "Offshore drilling drives climate change throughout its entire process. President Biden must permanently protect our coasts from offshore drilling and move us toward a clean energy future."
An earlier version of this article misstated the difference between the new temperature record and the pre-2023 record.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Presidential Debate Questions for a Sweltering World
Among the issues the candidates will address, climate disruption belongs at the top.
Jun 27, 2024
What would a realistic presidential debate look like in a nation where 100 million Americans recently sweltered under a massive heat dome while their nation led the world in oil and gas production—and consumption?
It's a fair bet it wouldn't look like the debate we'll have tonight.
If past is prologue, CNN moderators will devote no more than 10 minutes to a topic that’s easily worth a whole debate. Among the issues the candidates will address, climate disruption belongs at the top.
Yes, voters may be focused on pocketbook issues—such as rising prices, jobs, housing, childcare and health. But it’s the moderators’ job to remind them how a rapidly changing climate could exacerbate or overshadow all of these concerns.
Worried about the immigrants on the southern borders? The Institute for Economics & Peace (IEP) predicts that around 1.2 billion people could be displaced by 2050 due to climate change and natural disasters.
Health? Air pollution largely from fossil fuel burning already causes 7.5-8 million deaths a year due air pollution. It’s aggravated by higher temperatures. Hotter weather also spreads pest-borne illnesses, including Lyme disease and West Nile Virus.
Housing? Increased flood, fire, and hurricane risks lower property values. Rising seas threaten trillions of dollars worth of coastal property. Home insurance costs are already soaring, and policies are becoming less available in areas increasingly at risk from floods, hurricanes, and fire.
Heat waves meanwhile, aside from their health effects, erode purchasing power by increasing utility bills as people use more air conditioning. Blackouts and brownouts then become more frequent, as utility circuits are overwhelmed.
Dire as these issues may be, they pale in comparison to the apocalyptic outcomes scientists are now warning us against: irreversible melting of West Antarctica and Greenland, halting of the “conveyor belt” deep ocean current that distributes heat and moisture around the globe, and the release of vast amounts of methane, a powerful greenhouse gas, from the thawing Arctic permafrost.
The scientists who have correctly warned us about destabilizing the climate for years now are projecting that by 2050, global temperatures may rise 2ºC or more—curtains for nearly one in five land animals and a third of all insect species will be a high risk of extinction.
So if I were posing the questions tonight, I’d ask:
- Are we doing enough as a nation to protect the climate by reducing our greenhouse gas emissions? If not, how will you protect Americans from the impacts of rapid climate change on food, energy and insurance prices?
- As president, would you be prepared to declare a climate change a national emergency?
- Isn’t it past time to end the hundreds of billions of dollars in explicit and implicit annual taxpayer-funded subsidies to fossil fuel companies?
- Given the gravity of the climate crisis, do you support investing at least 2-3 percent of US GDP annually in an expedited national clean energy transition?
- Knowing that 60 of the world’s largest banks have invested $3.8 trillion in fossil fuels since the Paris Climate Agreement, would you support stronger regulation of banks by the federal government to discourage them from investing in fossil fuel companies that are in the process of expanding their production of fossil fuels?
- Would you support the legislation to implement adoption of a comprehensive scientifically based, National Climate Action Plan with enforceable deadlines? Or would you leave the mission of lowering U.S. emissions to free-market forces?
- Do you support a national carbon-fee-and dividend to cause the costs of the damages caused by fossil fuels to be reflected in its market price, with revenue rebated to low-income and middle interest people?
- Doesn’t our generation owe our children and grandchildren a stable climate, so they can have a healthy environment and a safe, prosperous future?
Keep ReadingShow Less
Chevron CEO Pay Jumped to $26.5 Million During Hottest Year on Record
News of Mike Wirth's 2023 compensation came after March was deemed the 10th month in a row to be the hottest ever recorded.
Apr 10, 2024
The chief executive of the U.S. oil giant Chevron saw his pay jump by more than 12% in 2023 as continued emissions from fossil fuel corporations helped push global temperatures to record heights.
Citing a new securities filing, Reuters reported Wednesday that Chevron CEO Mike Wirth received $26.5 million in total compensation last year. Chevron, the second-largest oil company in the U.S. by revenue, reported $21.3 billion in profits in 2023—a haul it used to lavish shareholders with buybacks and dividends.
News of Wirth's 2023 compensation came a day after the European Union's Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) announced that last month was the hottest March on record globally. The organization said March marked "the 10th month in a row that is the warmest on record for the respective month of the year."
Samantha Burgess, deputy director of C3S, said in a statement that "March 2024 continues the sequence of climate records toppling for both air temperature and ocean surface temperatures."
"Stopping further warming requires rapid reductions in greenhouse gas emissions," Burgess stressed.
But oil giants like Chevron, the primary drivers of the global climate emergency, have been rolling back their already tepid climate commitments and buying up rival oil producers—a signal that the industry is bent on continuing to drill as much as possible despite increasingly dire warnings from scientists.
A Carbon Majors report released earlier this week found that Chevron is one of just 57 oil, gas, coal, and cement producers responsible for 80% of global CO2 emissions from those industries.
A separate analysis published last month by Global Witness estimated that the emissions of Chevron, Shell, TotalEnergies, ExxonMobil, and BP could cause 11.5 million additional premature deaths around the world before the end of the century.
"In the past few months, ExxonMobil and Chevron have invested more than $100 billion into new oil and gas reserves," the human rights group noted. "BP and Shell weakened their climate pledges. And TotalEnergies plans to ramp up production in the next few years."
"Fossil fuel companies' systematic spreading of climate change denial, combined with lobbying, has slowed the transformation towards an energy system built on renewables," Global Witness added. "And yet, the supermajors are asking us to trust them, to allow them to be the ultimate arbiter, despite the massive profits they're making."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Most Popular