Climate scientists are warning the world may be getting closer to catastrophic global warming faster than projected based on news that February 2016 was the warmest month on record — despite there being an incredibly strong naturally-occurring warming event.
“We are in a kind of climate emergency now,” Stefan Rahmstorf, a climate scientist at the Potsdam Institute of Climate Impact Research, told The Sydney Morning Herald: “This is really quite stunning” and “it’s completely unprecedented.”
Newly updated National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) data shows February was 1.35 degrees Celsius warmer than the 1951 to 1980 average for that month. It’s even warmer than January’s 1.14 degrees Celsius — a record level for that month as well.
Gavin Schmidt, the head of NASA’s climate research unit, tweeted his own amazement at the record-high global average temperature for February.
Updates for February in @NASAGISS temperature analysis. Wow. pic.twitter.com/4YOJLjeZ5h
— Gavin Schmidt (@ClimateOfGavin) March 12, 2016
“Nasa dropped a bombshell of a climate report,” Jeff Masters and Bob Henson, weather data analysts with the Weather Underground, wrote on the website. “February dispensed with the one-month-old record by a full 0.21C ‚Äì an extraordinary margin to beat a monthly world temperature record by.”
But what’s gone unmentioned is the impact an incredibly strong El Ni√±o warming had on average global temperature last month. Indeed, the current El Ni√±o is said to the strongest such event in 18 years as it warms up ocean temperatures in the Pacific.
El Niño is a naturally-occurring warming phase across the span of the Pacific Ocean along the equator. It occurs fairly regularly, about every two to seven years, and if often followed by a La Niña cooling phase.
The current El Ni√±o reportedly peaked in December 2015, but it’s effects are felt for months after it starts to dissipate — which scientists expected. It’s not clear how much of global average temperature can be attributed to current El Ni√±o, but some say it only results in a few tenths of a degree of warming.
