Last month was the warmest February ever recorded. That appears from research published on Wednesday from the European climate agency Copernicus. The old record for warmest February was recorded in 2016, when it was 0.125 degrees Celsius colder than February this year. It is the ninth consecutive month in which a monthly record was set.
The average global temperature last month was 13.54 degrees, which was 0.81 degrees higher than the average February in the period between 1991 and 2020. Last February was 1.77 degrees warmer than the end of the 19th century. Only last December recorded a greater difference from the same month in the pre-industrial period.
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In particular, the temperatures of the oceans, which were higher than usual last year, have played a large role in the successive heat records, according to the study. In addition, there is scientific consensus that the climate change that the world has experienced in recent decades has been caused by human activities, including the excessive use of fossil fuels.
The European Climate Agency also calculated that over the past eight months — from July 2023 — global warming has exceeded 1.5 degrees. This maximum threshold was established by international policymakers in the Paris Climate Agreement in 2015. Although it should be noted that the agreement is based on figures spanning several decades, and not on calculations carried out on a monthly basis, as in the Copernicus study.