MILAN - Everybody felt it, and now the official scientific confirmation arrives. Last year has been the hottest ever, since the beginning of statistical measurements. NASA has made it public, together with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), an American federal agency. The report explains how the average global temperature has been one degree above the average of the 1880-1899 period: this value is the highest ever recorded in the last 136 years, higher by 0.16 degrees compared to the previous record year (2014).
The hot areas
Different areas have been affected by exceptional heat: Central America and the northern section of South America; various parts of Northern, Southern and Eastern Europe, reaching into Western Asia, and also Central and Eastern Siberia; some regions in South Africa, large areas of the north-western and equatorial Pacific Ocean and of the western North Atlantic, the most part of the Indian Ocean and areas of the Arctic Ocean. Also based on these data, the extension of snow cover in the northern hemisphere during 2015 has been of 24.6 million square km. It is the eleventh lowest extension from the start of measurements, in 1968, and the lowest since 2008.
Act after COP21
"The news regarding the 2015 record temperatures demonstrate that continuous climate change is now a reality". This is the comment made by Wolfgang Lucht, member of the Potsdam Institute For Climate Impact Research, in regard to the data provided by NASA and NOAA, which certify 2015 as the hottest year ever. "In the climate system, obviously, there are always natural variables", says Lucht with reference to the El Nino phenomenon, "but the trend is clearly on the rise. It has therefore been of paramount significance that the Paris agreement on climate has taken science into consideration. Now it is important to act accordingly".
by editorial staff
