This year has seen extreme heat in the Northern Hemisphere.
Europe is currently in its third heat wave of the summer and is threatening millions of people. More than 1000 heat-related deaths were reported by Portugal and Spain on Sunday. Thousands of people fled the fires. Sky News reported that there were two airports in the United Kingdom that had to suspend flights after their runways buckled in the heat. Wales recorded a high temperature. The UK expects temperatures to remain high on Tuesday.
Europe isn't the only hot spot. Almost all of the Northern Hemisphere has experienced record heat this month, from China to North Africa to the United States, where the heat is expected to continue for two more weeks. This year has seen a number of simultaneous heat waves.
Deepti Singh is a climate scientist at Washington State University.
Warming is increasing the likelihood of a heat wave. Singh lived through a heat wave that killed more than 1,400 people in the Pacific Northwest last year. Europe was also feeling the heat.
As global temperatures rise, they are becoming more common. Scientists warn that this summer may be the hottest in recent memory. Researchers say the world needs to cut greenhouse-gas emissions because of the heat waves that will dominate summers.
Cities should be prepared for the heat. Increasing greenery will provide residents with more shade and asphalt will heat up more in the sun. It is possible for governments to adapt to new extreme temperatures. Adding social infrastructure, like cooling centers, protects people who work outdoors.
According to a climate physicist at Columbia University, there needs to be a shift in the perception of what a heat wave actually means, that it's not fun at the beach, but that it's potentially dangerous to health.
Despite the polar regions being in different seasons, record heat hit both poles at the same time. A heat wave blanketed India and Pakistan. In June, heat-trapping weather systems scorched the US and Europe, setting all-time temperature records.
Andrew Dessler, a climate scientist at Texas A&M University, told The Associated Press in June that the world is on track for 4 degrees more warming over this century. I can't think of how bad that will be.
Further analysis can allow scientists to attribute certain heat waves to climate change. Scientists at World Weather Attribution found that climate change made the India-Pakistan heat wave more likely.
Global temperatures are making heat waves more common and long. The average heat-wave season in the US has increased by 45 days since 1960, according to the National Climate Assessment. The UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change expects the trend to continue.
There are bound to be simultaneous heat waves in different locations as they happen more frequently.
There are two regions in the mid latitudes that are experiencing large heat waves at the same time. Singh said that it's almost every day in the summer.
That is a new development. Each summer in the 1980s, concurrent heat waves only happened for 30 days. The study was published in the Journal of the American Meteorological Society in June. The study found that concurrent heat waves covered more space and reached higher intensities than in the past.
In a stable climate this summer is only unusual.
The climate is constantly shifting towards more extreme conditions. It's exactly what we would expect and what scientists have projected for the last decade.
He called for a rapid reduction in greenhouse gas emissions. We will see more record-breaking extremes, and more concurrent extremes just as this year, and even more extreme, if things keep developing the way they are.
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