(Washington) Last month was the hottest July on record and marked the fourteenth monthly temperature record in a row, according to a U.S. agency.
The year 2024 now has a 77% chance of being the warmest on record, the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) added in its monthly bulletin.
Last week, the European agency Copernicus, which uses a different dataset, estimated that July 2024 had been a little less hot than July 2023.
But both agencies agree that the situation is alarming, with every month for about a year recording exceptional monthly temperatures.
The year 2024 will almost certainly be among the five warmest years on record, according to NOAA, which has data going back 175 years.
In July, the global temperature was 1.21°C above the 20th average.e century (15.8°C), according to the American agency.
The period was notably marked by a series of heat waves in the Mediterranean and Gulf countries, she stressed. Africa, Europe and Asia recorded their hottest July, while it was the second hottest in North America.
The oceans recorded their second warmest July on record, according to NOAA – the same result here as Copernicus – ending 15 months of consecutive monthly temperature records in the seas.
But this slight improvement could have been more significant given the end of the El Niño climate phenomenon.
2023 had already been the hottest year on record.
“The devastating impacts of climate change began well before 2023 and will continue until global greenhouse gas emissions reach carbon neutrality,” Samantha Burgess, Deputy Head of Copernicus’ Climate Change Service (C3S), commented last week.