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2023 was the hottest year on Earth in world records dating back to 1850. (File)
Brussels:
The European Union’s climate change monitoring service said Tuesday that the world experienced the warmest March on record, ending a 10-month streak of setting new records for monthly maximum temperatures.
The EU’s Copernicus Climate Change Agency (C3S) announced in its monthly report that the past 10 months have all ranked as the world’s hottest months on record, compared to the same month last year.
According to C3S, the 12 months ending in March ranked as the hottest 12 months on record on Earth. The average global temperature from April 2023 to March 2024 was 1.58 degrees Celsius higher than the pre-industrial average from 1850 to 1900.
C3S deputy director Samantha Burgess told Reuters: “The long-term trend with an exceptional record is very concerning.”
“When you look at records like this, it’s easy to see that the climate is changing month after month, and it’s changing rapidly,” she added.
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The C3S dataset dates back to 1940, and scientists matched it with other data to confirm that last month was the hottest March since pre-industrial times.
Already, 2023 was the hottest year on Earth in world records dating back to 1850.
This year has seen extreme weather and extreme temperatures.
Climate change-induced drought in the Amazon rainforest caused a record number of wildfires in Venezuela between January and March, and drought wiped out crops in southern Africa, leaving millions facing hunger. There is.
Marine scientists warned last month that rising ocean temperatures are likely causing widespread coral bleaching in the Southern Hemisphere, potentially making it the worst event in Earth’s history.
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According to C3S, the main cause of extreme heat is anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions. Other factors pushing up temperatures include El Niño, a weather pattern that warms the surface waters of the eastern Pacific Ocean.
El Niño peaked in December and January, but is now weakening and could help break the heatwave towards the end of the year.
However, despite El Niño easing in March, global average sea surface temperatures were the highest ever for any month on record, and sea temperatures remained unusually high, C3S said.
“The main cause of global warming is fossil fuel emissions,” said Friederike Otto, a climate scientist at the Grantham Institute at Imperial College London.
Failure to reduce these emissions will lead to further global warming, resulting in more severe droughts, fires, heat waves and heavy rains, Otto said.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
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