"Extremely remarkable" 2017 heads toward record for hottest year without an El Niño episode.
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So it's been a surprise to climate scientists that 2017 has been so remarkably warm — because the last El Niño ended a year ago.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) reported Tuesday that the first half of 2017 was the second-warmest January-June on record for Earth, topped only by 2016, which was boosted by one of the biggest El Niños on record. "As if it wasn't shocking enough to see three consecutive record-breaking years, in 2014, 2015, and 2016, for the first time on record," leading climatologist Michael Mann wrote in an email to ThinkProgress, "we're now seeing near-record temperatures even in the absence of the El Nino 'assist' that the previous record year benefited from."
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Usually we see global records in years when the short-term El Niño warming adds to the long-term global warming trend (see chart below).
As NOAA noted in its March report, without an El Niño, no month before March 2017 had ever exceeded the "normal" temperature (the 1981–2010 average) by a full 1.8°F (1.0°C).
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Bottom line: Human-caused global warming continues at a dangerous pace, and only human action to slash carbon pollution can stop it.
Links
- The 'ancient carbon' of Alaska's tundra is being released, speeding up global warming
- March set a remarkable new record for global warming, NOAA reports
- Climate change poses 'nightmare scenario' for Florida coast, Bloomberg warns
- We aren't doomed by climate change. Right now we are choosing to be doomed.
- Climate scientist James Hansen: We aren't doing nearly enough to slow climate change
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