August joint-hottest month on record as climate change and El Niño drive heat — SkimNews
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- Copernicus confirmed August tied July 2023 as the hottest month on record, with global temperatures 1.65°C above pre-industrial levels — surpassing the 1.5°C threshold countries agreed under the Paris accord to avoid the worst consequences of warming.
- A strengthening El Niño is amplifying the heat by releasing stored Pacific ocean warmth into the atmosphere; Copernicus researchers warned it could become one of the most powerful on record, with peak global-temperature impact expected over the next year.
- Western Europe recorded its warmest summer ever, surpassing the deadly 2003 heatwave, while the UK logged its hottest summer since records began in 1884.
- The Met Office found human-caused climate change made the UK's record-breaking summer roughly 130 times more likely than it would have been otherwise.
- UN climate chief Simon Stiell called the record "the spiralling price of humanity's fossil fuel addiction" and said the evidence of human impact on the climate is "irrefutable."
- Dr. Clair Barnes of Imperial College London said the heat disrupted schools, strained hospitals, hit food production, fueled fires and drought, and claimed "tens of thousands of lives" — and warned records will keep falling until fossil fuel burning ends.
Why it matters: A single month crossing 1.65°C above pre-industrial levels — well past the Paris-aligned 1.5°C ceiling — paired with an El Niño still gaining strength means more monthly records are likely over the next 12 months. European governments already face documented costs: tens of thousands of heat-related deaths, strained hospitals, and food production losses from this summer's extremes.
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