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July 2021 was the warmest July on record for the globe
- low_common 5y agoInteresting that the Antarctic sea ice extent during July 2021 was above average; climate change is weird.
- istorical 5y agoThe long term trend in planetary sea ice still shows a decrease though, for more information on Arctic vs Antarctic ice: https://www.carbonbrief.org/guest-post-deciphering-the-rise-and-fall-of-antarctic-sea-ice-extent https://www.carbonbrief.org/guest-post-deciphering-the-rise-...
- swiley 5y agoOn the bright side we finally have a northwest passage.
- lmilcin 5y ago> The long term trend in planetary sea ice still shows a decrease though, This is an understatement of century. It would be better to say that the speed at which the ice cover melts exceeded worst case projections of even most pessimistic scientists.
- eloff 5y agoGlobal averages don't tell you much about any specific place. Weather varies considerably.
- Diederich 5y agohttps://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/charctic-interactive-sea-ice-graph/ https://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/charctic-interactive-sea-...
- horrified 5y agoI wish such articles would not always compare with averages. It is perfectly normal if sometimes measurements are above averages and sometimes below. At the very least, they should also give a range. Not saying there is no cause for concern, but saying "this year was above average" is meaningless in itself. As for the July record, OK - but also some points in time have to be the record.
- eCa 5y agoFrom the article: > The seven warmest Julys have all occurred since 2015. There seems to be a trend there.
- horrified 5y agoAre years the appropriate units for such comparisons, though? Anyway I give them their record, my main gripe is really the talk about averages. It's just plain misleading or at least not as informative as it could be.
- frenchyatwork 5y agoDecades are a better unit, but new decades only come once every 10 years. Units less than a year are problematic because of seasons. For example, you could say that July was the hottest month on record this year, and that wouldn't really tell you anything interesting (except that maybe more humans live in the north hemisphere and we mostly take observations where humans live).
- jcranmer 5y ago> For example, you could say that July was the hottest month on record this year, and that wouldn't really tell you anything interesting (except that maybe more humans live in the north hemisphere and we mostly take observations where humans live). Water has a relatively large heat capacitance, which means that it is more resistant to changing temperature. As a result, places near large bodies of water tend to see lower highs and higher lows than places not near them. Compare the climate of, say, Mumbai (whose highs vary between 30 and 34C around the year) versus Nagpur (whose highs vary between 29 and 43C), both of which are at roughly the same latitude, but one is coastal and the other substantially more inland. The southern hemisphere has very little land, especially in the temperate belt (between Tropic of Capricorn and Antarctic Circle)--that land is Argentina, Chile, Uruguay, a smallish part of Brazil, South Africa, half of Australia, New Zealand, and small fragments of a few more countries. There's no major landmasses to vary in temperature with the seasons like there is in the northern hemisphere, and hence the southern hemisphere has a much smaller role than the northern hemisphere in measuring global climatic fluctuations.
- asciimov 5y agoFor me in South Texas, it was one of the coolest summers I can remember. We had no days at or above 100, and most of the month was below average. This was due to the High Pressure dome not being over us as it normally is, causing us to have lots of rain. Many Texans were happy that this summer wasn't a scorcher. While I understand that this weather isn't good (or normal) for us, I fear the nice weather will just make more Texans not care about climate change.
- avisser 5y agoFor me in Rhode Island, it's been quite warm. Today @ 91 degrees is similar to trend I've seen all summer - a near uniform temperature for the whole East Coast. It's 91 today in Atlanta GA, Jackson MS, & Houston TX. It's also 91 in Burlington VT & Bangor ME. It's been strange like that all summer.
- asciimov 5y agoIt's 85°F in my backyard right now, I can remember several summers where the night time low in mid-August stayed above 85 (or 90). Those are miserable days.
- arbuge 5y agoInteresting article about this point yesterday: https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-08-12/u-s-climate-change-is-easier-to-see-on-the-coasts https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-08-12/u-s-cl...
- eloff 5y agoWe've been "enjoying" your high pressure system up in the Pacific Northwest. There are plenty of places at the equator that were cooler than Vancouver yesterday. You can have it back. Please.
- valleyjo 5y agoI’m so sad for the glaciers in Washington state :’(
- productceo 5y agoInstead of "warmest", we need to use "hottest" or "highest temperature". Warm sounds like it is nice and cozy. I live in Seatte and it was NOT nice and cozy.
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- kleiba 5y agoAfter three really hot summers in a row, this July was thankfully cool, almost too cold, where I live. Lots of rain too, which was a bit annoying.
- kleiba 5y agoI cannot really imagine what would trigger anyone to downvote that comment. As off-topic perhaps?!
- unity1001 5y agoA weather station in Sicily, Italy recorded 120 degrees celsius heat at one point. 120 degrees celsius. 20 degrees higher than boiling point of water...
- perfunctory 5y agoIn case somebody is wondering about the importance of a temperature record I'll repost my old comment here. https://books.google.com/books?id=N0FLSOmeFPsC&pg=PT59 https://books.google.com/books?id=N0FLSOmeFPsC&pg=PT59 Bottom line: records are extremely rare if events occur at random. If new records become far more common than the harmonic series predicts, then this is telling us that annual climatic events are no longer independent annual events but are beginning to form part of a systematic non-random trend.
- chrisco255 5y agohttps://www.nsstc.uah.edu/climate/ https://www.nsstc.uah.edu/climate/ Not according to the Earth System Science Center in University of Alabama-Huntsville. July 2021 was only 0.2C above the 1991-2020 average based on satellite measurements of the lower troposphere. Greenland had a mild melt season and is currently above 1981-2010 average surface mass balance: http://polarportal.dk/en/greenland/surface-conditions/ http://polarportal.dk/en/greenland/surface-conditions/ The southern hemisphere has had a rather cold winter, resulting in below average temps for South America, South Africa and Australia. Brazil had snow: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/rare-snowfall-blankets-cities-across-brazil-180978339/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/rare-snowfall-blan... Coffee crops froze in July. https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/freak-brazil-frost-hits-heart-coffee-belt-damaging-crops-2021-07-21/ https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/freak-brazil-frost-hi... Four south african cities had their coldest temps on record: https://www.thesouthafrican.com/news/weather/breaking-weather-forecast-south-africa-where-coldest-ever-temperatures-record/ https://www.thesouthafrican.com/news/weather/breaking-weathe... Australia had one of its coldest, wettest July's in decades: https://www.news.com.au/technology/environment/wettest-july-in-decades-for-parts-of-australia-likely-following-soaking-week/news-story/3506cbe78cb413d4b7f8f8b523a0c308 https://www.news.com.au/technology/environment/wettest-july-... Antarctica sea ice extent is well above 1981-2010 average: https://usicecenter.gov/Products/AntarcCharts https://usicecenter.gov/Products/AntarcCharts
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- nonameiguess 5y agoThey're not measuring the same thing: https://kenskingdom.wordpress.com/2015/11/20/why-are-surface-and-satellite-temperatures-different/ https://kenskingdom.wordpress.com/2015/11/20/why-are-surface... Ground temperature measures air temperate at 1.5 meters. Lower troposphere measures the average from 0 meters to 10 km, weighted heavily toward the lower 4 km. It's not exactly intuitive why ground temperature and lower troposphere temperature should be different, but in short, during wet seasons, troposphere will be relatively warmer, and during dry seasons, ground will be relatively warmer. I think ground is what we care about here, though, as that most directly impacts human wellbeing.