Salerno, summer is increasingly tropical

Just on July 22nd, planet Earth set a new record: it was the day with the highest average global temperature ever recorded. A sign of the changing times, of that global warming that, year after year, is showing all its signs and consequences. Just look at what is happening this summer in our territory where the “heat waves” have been following one another for weeks now and there is really no room to get out of this blanket of heat and breathe. Sensations that are easily tangible by observing the data provided – minute by minute – by experts and meteorologists. And that, now, are sounding another alarm for Salerno: the city of Arechi, in fact, is one of the capitals of Italy where the highest number of “tropical nights” and where the average temperature – in just a few years – has risen by almost one degree centigrade.

Tropical Nights Alert

By “tropical night” we mean the period in which, at sunset, the temperature does not fall below 20 degrees. A limit that, if exceeded, causes physical discomfort during the hours usually dedicated to sleep. And “tropical nights” are being recorded repeatedly in Italy. For some time: according to Istat data processed by OpenPolis, in fact, during 2022 there were 6,182 reports of this phenomenon recorded in the 109 Italian provincial capitals. The summary of this processing highlights how the national average is equal to 58.3 tropical nights for each provincial capital. And 52, instead, exceed this limit. Among these is also Salerno. The city of Arechi far exceeds the indicator: in 2022, in fact, there were 77 evenings in which 20° C was constantly exceeded. In practice, for over two months in the shadow of the Castello d’Arechi we have lived with uncomfortable temperatures during the night hours.

A worrying fact that, however, is not unprecedented: already in 2020, in fact, a previous elaboration by OpenPolis highlighted how Salerno was in 2019 the Italian capital with the highest number of tropical nights recorded. Also because the prospects for the future are bleak: based on some scientific elaborations carried out by the portal ilMeteo.itin fact, in 2030 there will be over 110 tropical nights in Salerno. Almost four months, in practice, with hot nights. «The areas of the country that are affected the longest during the year are the southern areas – OpenPolis highlights in its analysis – . These are territories where we often have to deal with severe droughts and extreme temperatures. But values ​​higher than the national average are also found in the Po Valley and in densely built-up cities».