EU climate scientists: 2023 on track to be ‘warmest year on record’

Climate scientists have warned this year is set to be the world’s hottest on record after global temperatures soared in September.

A Greek flag flies during a wildfire on the outskirts of Athens in August. Picture: Angelos Tzortzinis / AFP

Climate scientists have warned 2023 is on track to be the world’s hottest on record after global temperatures soared in September.

On Thursday, the EU’s Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) said global average temperatures for January through to September were 1.4C higher than during the pre-industrial period of 1850 to 1900.

The result was 0.5C higher than for the equivalent period in 2016, which is the current record-holder for the world’s hottest year.

The scientists also said data from the month of September contained the largest temperature anomalies of any year stretching back to 1940, with the month as a whole found to be 1.75C warmer when compared to the pre-industrial period.

The first global temperature data is in for the full month of September. This month was, in my professional opinion as a climate scientist – absolutely gobsmackingly bananas. JRA-55 beat the prior monthly record by over 0.5C, and was around 1.8C warmer than preindutrial levels. pic.twitter.com/mgg3rcR2xZ

— Zeke Hausfather (@hausfath) October 3, 2023

In fact, Zeke Hausfather, climate lead at tech company Strike and a scientist at Berkeley Earth, described September’s temperatures as “absolutely gobsmackingly bananas”.

Samantha Burgess, deputy director of the C3S, described September’s results as unprecedented and record-breaking.

“The unprecedented temperatures for the time of year observed in September — following a record (northern hemisphere) summer — have broken records by an extraordinary amount,” she said in a statement.

“This extreme month has pushed 2023 into the dubious honour of first place — on track to be the warmest year and around 1.4°C above pre-industrial average temperatures.”

A thermometer clocks 45C during a heatwave in Seville, Spain in August. Picture: Marcelo del Pozo/Getty Images

World leaders will convene in Dubai in the United Arab Emirates — which, curiously, have some of the world’s highest levels of emissions per capita — in late November and early December for talks on how to address climate change.

Dr Burgess said that, two months out from the COP28 conference, “the sense of urgency for ambitious climate action has never been more critical.”

C3S’s declaration comes after a major UN report found that the world is, unsurprisingly, not on track to meet the long-term goals of the 2015 Paris Agreement.

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Originally published as EU climate scientists: 2023 on track to be ‘warmest year on record’