Climate entering “unchartered territory” – 7 years warmest on record

The seven years between 2015 and 2021 will likely be the warmest on record to date, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) announced on Sunday, in a report warning that the climate is entering “uncharted territory.”

The annual report on the state of the climate “is based on the latest scientific data that shows that the planet is changing before our eyes,” said UN Secretary-General António Guterres, quoted in the text.

“From the deep ocean to the mountain tops, from melting glaciers to relentless extreme weather events, ecosystems and communities around the world are being destroyed,” he added.

The text, prepared from observations on the ground and through satellites of meteorological services from around the world, is published at the beginning of the UN climate change conference, COP26, this Sunday.

The Scottish city of Glasgow hosts this key conference, in which the international community must step up its fight to limit global warming and ideally bring it to a maximum of + 1.5ºC.

COP26 “must be a turning point for people and the planet,” said Guterres.

The report is based on the historical records of temperatures on the planet, and in particular, uses the period 1850-1910 that the UN climate experts (IPCC) use as a basis to compare with today.

Humanity is currently emitting much more than twice the greenhouse gas emissions compared to that time.

However, these historical records do not take into account previous meteorological phenomena, which are recorded thanks to climatic paleontology.

Alarming tone
The tone of the WMO report is alarming, linking droughts, forest fires, major floods in different regions of the planet with human activity.

“2021 is less warm than recent years due to the influence of a moderate La Niña episode that occurred at the beginning of the year. La Niña has a temporary cooling effect on the global average temperature and affects regional meteorological and climatic conditions. In 2021, the La Niña seal was clearly observed in the tropical Pacific, ”the text recalled.

However, the average temperature of the last 20 years exceeds the symbolic barrier of + 1 ° C for the first time.

“The persistent above-average rainfall during the first half of the year in some parts of northern South America, especially in the northern Amazon basin, caused severe and long-lasting flooding in the region,” he added. the text.

And at the same time, “for the second year in a row, there were major droughts that devastated a large part of the subtropical region of South America. The precipitations were very inferior to the average in most of the south of Brazil, Paraguay, Uruguay and the north of Argentina ”.