It’s Official: 2023 Was the Hottest Year on Record

“The European Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) reports that 2023 was the hottest year in the instrumental temperature record. That’s in part because global temperatures were boosted by the El Niño phenomenon in which the eastern Pacific Ocean surface temperature periodically surges higher.”

“”Not only is 2023 the warmest year on record, it is also the first year with all days over 1°C warmer than the pre-industrial period. Temperatures during 2023 likely exceed those of any period in at least the last 100,000 years,” noted Samantha Burgess, deputy director of C3S, in a press release.”

“The satellite temperature series run by climatologists Roy Spencer and John Christy at the University of Alabama in Huntsville (UAH) also basically concurs, reporting that 2023 is the hottest year in its 45-year record.”

“The C3S report observed that atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations reached the highest levels ever recorded, 419 parts per million for carbon dioxide and 1902 parts per billion for methane. UAH’s Christy cautiously concedes that the “background climate-trend is about +0.1 °C per decade and could represent the warming effect of the extra greenhouse gases that are being added to the atmosphere as human development progresses.””

https://reason.com/2024/01/09/its-official-2023-was-the-hottest-year-on-record/

The Florida Barrier Reef’s Last Stand

“unseasonably hot water arrived this summer, meaning those coral colonies had to endure months of extreme water temperatures. A buoy off Florida recorded 101-degree water temperatures this July. When corals are stressed by hot or cold water, they lose their color—a result of expelling algae that provides corals with most of their energy—and eventually die.”

“If the reefs collapsed completely, it would be disastrous for the Florida Keys. According to the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, the reefs in Southeast Florida are valued at $8.5 billion and sustain 70,000 full- and part-time jobs. The barrier reef also protects the Keys from hurricanes and major storms by soaking up wave action.”

https://reason.com/2023/12/19/the-florida-barrier-reefs-last-stand/

How Hurricane Otis defied forecasts and exploded into a deadly storm overnight

“This year’s El Niño, coupled with ongoing climate change, has amplified many of the drivers of hurricanes, and their destructive elements.”

“El Niño, the warm phase of the Pacific Ocean’s temperature cycle, has been especially strong this year, driving global air and ocean temperatures to levels never before recorded. Hurricanes require sea surface temperatures of 80 degrees Fahrenheit or more to form, so hotter weather tends to favor more hurricanes. In the Atlantic Ocean, El Niño also tends to create wind shear — wind coming from different directions or at different speeds — which usually suppresses hurricane formation, but the water temperatures have been so hot that hurricane activity in the Atlantic has still been above average.
In the Pacific, El Niño is much more favorable to tropical storms (in the eastern Pacific, major tropical storms are called hurricanes, while in the west, they’re known as typhoons). This year, the west coast of North America has already seen several hurricanes. Hurricane Hilary struck California in August, and the winds from Hurricane Dora fanned the flames of wildfires in Hawaii.”

https://www.vox.com/climate/23932000/hurricane-otis-mexico-acapulco-rapid-intensification-extreme-climate

The Southern Hemisphere, where it’s winter, has been really hot too

“Winters tend to be milder in the Southern Hemisphere than in the North, and many of the factors that cranked up the heat across North America, Europe, and Asia in recent months are doing the same thing below the equator: Ocean temperature cycles like El Niño are in their warm phases, while greenhouse gasses from burning fossil fuels are accumulating in the atmosphere, warming the planet and changing its climate. So the hot winter across the Southern Hemisphere this year lined up with what scientists expected.”

““The biggest difference between the Northern and Southern hemispheres as a whole is that the North contains more large continents with an Arctic Ocean, whereas the Southern features fewer large land areas, the Southern Ocean and then Antarctica,” Grose said.
The oceans act like shock absorbers for weather and have a moderating effect on the climate. The Southern Hemisphere, with proportionately more ocean than land, tends to have a less drastic swing between seasons than places above the equator. That also means that winters in the south start from a warmer baseline than winters in the north.

So countries like Brazil rarely get chilly weather in the winter. “It’s dry and mild,” said Fábio Luiz Teixeira Gonçalves, a professor of geosciences at the University of São Paulo. Temperatures typically range between 53°F and 78°F, but they have been about 3.6°F higher on average since May around São Paulo. Those higher average temperatures fueled more extreme heat.”

“Hotter weather in the winter can have a lot of important consequences, even if temperatures don’t reach the triple-digit peaks of the summer. Plants, for instance, rely on temperature signals to time their life-cycles”

“Cold temperatures also keep dangerous insects in check”

“Warmer, drier winters also mean that there is less water recharging rivers and groundwater supplies, and thus less water available for agriculture the following season.”

https://www.vox.com/climate/23864998/heat-wave-south-america-brazil-australia-argentina-hemisphere-winter

How Louisiana — one of the nation’s wettest states — caught on fire

“Much like other places, Louisiana is experiencing record-breaking heat and dryness, which have made it easier for wildfires to proliferate.”

https://www.vox.com/climate/2023/8/30/23852363/louisiana-wildfires

This summer is giving us a glimpse at the dangerous future of work

“Temperatures also don’t have to be very high for strenuous work to become deadly. The lack of heat acclimatization all too frequently kills workers; the majority of workers who die from heat do so in the first few days at work. “A lot of workers will actually end up in heatstroke during the first week on the job,” says Brenda Jacklitsch, a health scientist at the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH).
Extreme heat is also affecting productivity. According to a 2022 study by The Lancet, which is tracking the relationship between climate change and public health, about 470 billion hours of labor were lost in 2021 due to extreme heat. The US alone lost 2.5 billion hours, mostly in the construction, manufacturing, service, and agriculture sectors.”

https://www.vox.com/23844420/extreme-heat-work-labor-osha-climate-change

Temperatures exceeding 123 Fahrenheit plunges country into 2-day nationwide shutdown: ‘Preserve the health of the citizens’

“Iran shut down government agencies, banks, and schools nationwide in early August, with temperatures soaring higher than 123 degrees Fahrenheit in places and the power grid struggling”https://www.yahoo.com/news/temperatures-exceeding-123-fahrenheit-plunges-050000372.html