Record-breaking heat: visualizing the effects of the climate crisis
We explored rising temperatures and their impact through interactive data visualizations
Summer has only just started and the world’s warmest day since records began was hit last week, the UK has recorded the hottest June in history, several countries in Asia saw some of the highest temperatures to date and wildfires are raging across Canada.
The world is getting hotter. Recent years have seen record divergences from the average global temperature recorded between 1951 and 1980, data from the Berkeley Earth Land/Ocean Temperature Record shows.
In 2020, global temperatures were 1.51°C higher than the average – a record high. The 16 hottest global temperatures in the data have all occurred in the last 20 years (since 2002).
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With rising temperatures, record-highs become more common.
Looking at extreme temperatures around the world since 2002 shows the number of records going up in recent years.
However, an improved recording system along with heightened awareness might contribute to increase in documented heat records.
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Looking at European countries specifically, the majority of temperature records have been broken in recent years.
Almost half of the records have only been broken within the last ten years, with 72% being surpassed since the start of the century.
Only two years ago, in August 2021, the highest temperature ever seen in Europe was reached in Italy, at 48.8°C.
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Urban heat islands
Densely populated urban areas are often hotter than their surrounding areas, with the impacts felt most during summer months. These metropolitan places are called urban heat islands.
Buildings, pavements and a lack of greenery lead to cities getting hotter than tree-lined communities or rural areas with fewer people and buildings.
Climate Central has ranked cities in the U.S. by their intensity of urban heat islands. New Orleans, New York City, Houston, and San Francisco have scored the highest.
We looked at the maximum temperatures in these cities in 2022 and compared them to the temperatures in the city’s state and counties in the same state.
What impacts do heatwaves have on us?
Extreme heat can have a range of impacts. Heat can exacerbate drought, and hot, dry conditions can create wildfire conditions.
Hot days are also associated with increases in heat-related illnesses, with high humidity and elevated nighttime temperatures as key ingredients in causing illness and mortality. Older adults, infants and children, people with chronic health conditions, and outdoor workers are particularly vulnerable.
Excess deaths Europe
The impact of heatwaves can also be reflected in excess mortality which refers to the increase in the number deaths compared to the expected value during a reference period.
Excess mortality in the EU climbed to +17% in July 2022, amounting to around 53,000 additional deaths compared with the monthly averages for 2016-2019.
According to Eurostat, this was an unusually high value for this month. In 2020 and 2021, the excess mortality rate ranged between +3% and +6%.
Therefore, some of the mortality increase in July 2022 might be due to the heatwaves that have affected parts of Europe.
The highest excess mortality rates in July 2022 were recorded in Spain (+37%) and Cyprus (+30%).
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Why it is getting hotter
The climate crisis is causing global temperatures to rise. This has brought more extreme weather, including record-breaking high temperatures across the world.
The pace of warming has accelerated in recent decades and as long as the world continues to warm, this trend will continue.
The IPCC has predicted five futures which model the global temperatures from now until the year 2100 depending on different factors such as population size and CO2 emissions.
The most optimistic scenario is the first path, SSP1-1.9, and would see a temperature increase of 1.4°C after cutting emissions.
If greenhouse gas and CO2 emissions stay the same as they are now and do not reach net zero before 2100, the world would warm by over 2°C (SSP2-4.5).
In the worst case scenario (SSP5-8.5), the world would warm by 4.4°C on average if current emission levels double.
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Almost all regions on Earth have already seen increases in hot extremes.
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Periods of intense heat occur within natural weather patterns, but scientists say that globally they are becoming more frequent, more intense and are lasting longer as a result of global warming.
Depending on the scenario, exposure to heatwaves might become up to 36 times higher. This is if we see high population growth together with high emissions (SSP3-RCP8.5)
If population growth is slower (SSP5) or the trajectory of emissions stays as it is now (RCP4.5), the exposure might be lower – but still higher than it is now.
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With the warming planet, extreme temperature events become more likely.
An extreme temperature event that occurred once in 10 years, will likely happen 5.6 times if the world heats up by 2°C — which will happen if emissions stay the same as they are now.
If the planet warms by 4°C, these events will likely occur 9.4 times.
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Extreme temperature events will also increase in intensity and — in the worst case scenario — be 5.1°C hotter.
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Climate change is already having visible effects on the world and will continue to have impacts such as risk to water supplies and food insecurity, flooding, conflict and climate migrants, loss of biodiversity, wildfires, and heat stress.
The European Commission estimates that, without climate mitigation and adaptation, the death-toll from extreme heat in the EU could be more than 30 times more than at present by the end of this century.
If emissions stay the same and the planet warms by 2°C global warming in 2100, 50,000 Europeans could die annually from extreme heat.