Past seven years hottest on record - Ocean and Coastal Futures

The past seven years have been the hottest on record, according to new data from the EU’s satellite system.

The Copernicus Climate Change Service said 2021 was the fifth-warmest year, with record-breaking heat in some regions.

And the amount of warming gases in our atmosphere continued to increase.

Governments are committed to limiting global temperature rise to 1.5C to curb climate change. But scientists warn that time is fast running out.

The environmental, human and economic costs of hotter temperatures are already being seen globally.

Europe lived through its warmest summer, and temperature records in western US and Canada were broken by several degrees. Extreme wildfires in July and August burnt almost entire towns to the ground and killed hundreds.

“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,” Carlo Buontempo, director of the Copernicus Climate Change Service, explains.

The Copernicus data comes from a constellation of Sentinel satellites that monitor the Earth from orbit, as well as measurements taken at ground level.

Fifth-warmest year

Copernicus data showed that 2021 was the fifth-hottest on record, marginally warmer than 2015 and 2018. Taken together, the past seven years were the hottest seven years on record by a clear margin, the agency explained.

The 2021 average temperature was 1.1-1.2C above the pre-industrial level around 150 years ago.

It would be easy to dismiss the latest global temperature figure as a non-event. Who celebrates fifth place in anything?

If we were in a film, these annual temperature updates would be the ominous drum beat signalling the plot is darkening.

They measure out the pace of change in our world. The increments may be tiny – a fraction of a degree – but the direction of travel is inescapable.

And make no mistake, the rhythm they mark out increasingly sets the pace for all our lives. Think of the fires and floods that affected so many people in 2021.

And now look again at what the data is telling us: the seven hottest years ever recorded have been the last seven years.

We can’t say we weren’t warned.