Europe experienced its hottest summer on record last year. Heat waves, wildfires and melting glaciers were no exception. A new report shows how climate change shaped the European climate in 2022.
The conclusions in the annual State of the Climatereport of the European Space and Climate Institute Copernicus are not tender.
In that report, scientists determine the state of the climate in Europe. For example, it can be read that in 2022 the continent experienced the second warmest year since measurements began.
The European summer of 2022 was even the hottest on record. On average, it was 1.4 degrees warmer than in the past three decades. In Southern Europe in particular, there were more extremely hot days. According to the report, this is in line with the trend of recent years.
The rise in temperature was accompanied by drought: there was 10 percent less precipitation across Europe. It was also a very sunny year.
Wildfires and melting glaciers
We see the consequences of that heat and drought in agriculture, in the energy sector and in water transport, for example. But also think of forest fires. There were more than usual last year, especially in the Mediterranean area. These forest fires release CO2, which causes the earth to warm up further.
In 2022 it snowed thirty days less than usual in the Alps. When it is warmer and there is less snow, glaciers melt faster. Across Europe – and particularly in the Italian Alps – glaciers lost as much as 5 cubic kilometers of ice in a year. Melting glacial ice is one of the causes of sea level rise.
In the Netherlands we had in 2022 according to the KNMI the third warmest and sunniest year since 1901. The winter was mild and the summer warm, sunny and dry. On July 19, for example, it became almost 40 degrees in Beek in Limburg. According to the weather institute, we will have to deal with more and more extreme weather due to climate change.
2023-04-20 06:04:19
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