In 2021, the global average temperature was more than one degree above the pre-industrial level – just like in the previous six years. This was reported by the World Weather Organization (WMO) on Wednesday in Geneva. The seven years since 2015 are the hottest since records began more than 100 years ago. Since the 1980s, each decade has been warmer than the previous one.
The global average temperature in 2021 was about 1.11 (± 0.13) degrees Celsius above the level from 1850 to 1900. This is the result of combining data from six leading institutions. These include the US climate agency NOAA and the EU’s Copernicus Climate Change Service. NOAA ranked 2021 as the sixth warmest year and Copernicus as the fifth warmest.
The previous record year was 2016 with around 1.2 degrees above the pre-industrial level, closely followed by 2019 and 2020. The WMO emphasizes that the differences between the individual years are sometimes so small that an exact ranking can hardly be determined.
© Crown Copyright / Met Office (detail)
The deviation of global mean temperature from pre-industrial levels | Six series of measurements consistently show an upward trend.
“The impacts of climate change and weather-related hazards have had life-altering and devastating consequences for people on every continent,” said WMO Secretary-General Petteri Taalas. He recalled record temperatures of almost 50 degrees in Canada, deadly floods in Asia and Europe and droughts in Africa and South America.
The high average temperature of 2021 was achieved despite the year being characterized by a sustained La Niña situation. This weather phenomenon, which occurs every few years, depresses the average global temperature because it causes the upper water layers of the tropical eastern Pacific to cool abnormally. (dpa/jad)