Record September temperatures stump scientists

September set a new temperature record, half a degree above the previous record from 2020, and 0.93 degrees higher than the average of the last three decades, according to the latest data from the European climate change service Copernicus.

From extreme summer to hot autumn… July, August and September have set three consecutive records and 2023 is on track to become the warmest year on record, ahead of 2016. October has also started with record temperatures in Spain and much of Europe.

“What has happened in the last month has left me absolutely perplexed, in my opinion by a climate scientist,” Zeke Hausfather, an analyst at Berkeley Earth and Carbon Brief, wrote on Twitter/X, who highlights the combined impact of climate change with the phenomenon of natural warming of the Pacific known as El Niño.

“The unprecedented temperatures observed in September, after a record summer, have exceeded the maximums set until this year in an extraordinary way,” acknowledged Samantha Burgess, deputy director of the Copernicus program.

The average temperature in September was in fact 1.75 degrees higher than that estimated for the same dates in the pre-industrial period. The specific data from the last month has created concern among scientists, although the global increase in temperatures is currently estimated at 1.1 and 1.2 degrees.

In 2015, the Paris Agreement set the goal of “keeping the increase in global average temperature well below 2ºC with respect to pre-industrial levels, continuing efforts to limit this increase in temperature to 1.5ºC with respect to pre-industrial levels.” to pre-industrial levels.

With data on temperatures still hot, the UN published this week a new synthesis report on the global balance of emissions. The study – the second of its kind to be published in the final stretch towards COP28 in Dubai – warns that most countries are “very far from meeting” the objectives of the Paris Agreement and that “much more action will be needed ” to limit the increase in temperatures to 1.5 degrees.

The new report sets the goal of 2030 to provide 190 billion euros annually to the loss and damage financing fund, to cover the impact of climate change in the poorest and most vulnerable countries.. Among the report's recommendations are tripling renewable energy capacity, doubling energy efficiency measures and ending oil exploration “exploration” by 2030, although there are no guarantees these proposals will even be discussed in COP28.

“We have clear objectives that should serve as a reference for the action that is required for all countries,” said Simon Stiell, the UN's top climate change official.. “While most countries agree on the need for a change of course, there is significant divergence on how the necessary changes can be achieved.”