Leading British meteorologists warn that even if humans manage to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius, summer temperatures in the UK may often exceed 40 degrees Celsius.
The UK has seen more and more extreme weather, and 2020 is the third warmest, fifth wettest and eighth sunny year on record-this is the first ever in all three variables. The year in which both China entered the top 10.
The data published in the “State of the UK’s Climate in 2020” report shows that the average winter temperature last year was 5.3 to 1.6 degrees Celsius higher than the average temperature from 1981 to 2010.
Heat wave
This makes December 2019 to February 2020 the fifth warmest winter on record, while the temperature last summer was 14.8 degrees Celsius, 0.4 degrees Celsius above average.
According to the author of the report, in early August 2020, the temperature reached 34 degrees Celsius for six consecutive days, and five of the “tropical nights” had mercury temperatures not lower than 20 degrees Celsius, making it one of the worst heat waves affecting southern England in the past 60 years. one.
Comparing the temperature series of central England dating back to 1772, the study found that in the early 21st century, it was 0.5 to 1 degree Celsius higher than that from 1901 to 2000, and 0.5 to 1.5 degrees Celsius higher than that from 1801 to 1900.
Professor Liz Bentley, CEO of the Royal Meteorological Society, said that the world has experienced extreme high temperatures due to an increase of 1.1 to 1.2 degrees Celsius from pre-industrial levels.
“If you raise another 0.3 degrees Celsius, these (heat waves) will only become more intense-we might see 40 degrees Celsius in the UK, even though we (before) have never seen this temperature,” she said.
Blow away
“When we reach 1.5 degrees Celsius of global warming, it will not only be something we see once or twice, it will start to become something we often see.”
Mike Kenden, a climate scientist at the Met Office and lead author of the report, said these figures indicate the new normal in the UK.
“In seven of the past 10 years, we have seen the temperature in the UK reach 34 degrees Celsius, and there were seven of the first 50 years before that,” he said.
“So this shows that our climate baseline is changing, and what we think is normal is changing.”
Mr. Kenden warned that man-made global warming will continue for a “very, very long period of time”, adding that scientists at the National Climate Information Center of the Bureau of Meteorology have been “shocked” by the extreme high temperature of 49.6 degrees Celsius on the west coast in recent weeks. Canada.
Wettest
“If there is no impact of man-made warming, such an event is basically impossible. This is obviously a very serious impact,” he said.
In addition to warming, since 2009, the UK has recorded the wettest February in 2020, the wettest April and June 2012, the wettest November 2009 and the wettest December 2015. This is a series of records dating back to 1862.
From the 47,000-day data set, two of the three wettest days on record were recorded last year-February 15, 2020 and October 3, 2020.
The 21st century also witnessed the wettest and second wettest winters in the UK in 2014 and 2016 respectively.
Changes in temperature and rainfall patterns have an increasing impact on nature. The first leaf date in 2020 is 10.4 days ahead of the baseline from 1999 to 2019 on average, covering a range of common British shrubs and tree species.
Fault
According to the report, the leaves also fall earlier, and the end of the season for bare trees in 2020 is 4.3 days earlier than the baseline for the same species.
Dr. Darren Moorcroft, Chief Executive Officer of Woodland Trust, said this study can show whether it is possible for species that are related to each other to be “out of sync with each other in their natural environment.”
He said that this may herald a break in the food chain in the future, making it difficult for some species to survive.
The British Climate Status in 2020 was published in the Royal Meteorological Society’s International Journal of Climatology.
This author
Tess de la Mare is a journalist for PA.
