Will 2016 Be the Hottest Year on Record?

Though there are still a couple of months of 2016 left, it seems that we’re beyond the past of all doubt that this year will be the hottest year since records began. A string of factors, including the oceanic weather phenomenon El Niño and accelerated climate change brought about by increased emissions, has led to month after month of temperatures breaking records across the globe.

As a result, NASA has all but confirmed that 2016 will be hotter than any year previous since records began over a century ago.

A year of record-breaking months

For many years, it was thought that 1934 was the hottest annum on record. However, a report published earlier this year put paid to that idea by highlighting that the 1934 figures only took the USA into account, thus neglecting a significant proportion of the Earth’s land surface (98%). As such, it was proved that last year was in fact the hottest since records began.

 2016 started where 2015 left off, with Gavin Schmidt predicting there was a 99.9% chance it would end up trumping its predecessor back in May. As director of the Goddard Institute for Space Studies, Schmidt is clearly a man who knows what he’s talking about – and so the ensuing five months have proved.

July, August and September all broke meteorological records in different guises, with the first two the hottest calendars months since records began and September the hottest one for 136 years. Now in October, Schmidt reiterated his confidence that 2016 will surpass previous records on Twitter, tweeting: “With data now available through September, 2016 annual record (~1.25ºC above late 19th C) seems locked in.”

What next for the future?

With leaders of 196 countries around the world having met in Paris in December of last year and agreeing to tackle the problem of climate change head-on by limiting a global temperature rise to 1.5°C, it’s encouraging to see world leaders are at least considering the issue at hand.

However, with 2016 smashing previous records for temperature almost across the board, it’s difficult not to be worried about the future of our planet. As Boston College climate expert Jeremy Shakun explains “The bottom line, to me, is unassailable. With emissions continuing at the rate they’re going a little while longer, I see no way to argue that we aren’t handing off plenty of climate impacts to future generations.”

The good news is that Shakun doesn’t anticipate 2017 to break records yet again, citing the occurrence of El Niño as a one-off event which was a huge contributing factor in this year’s global spike. “I don’t think we’ll necessarily see 1.25 degrees next year,” he said.

However, he was quick to caution about reading too much into such a statement. “Nonetheless, the important thing is the long-term warming trend,” he went on, highlighting that temperatures have risen steadily since the 1880s – all because of human activity since the Industrial Revolution. If we want to avoid continued global warming in the future and meet those targets outlined at the Paris COP21 summit, we must get serious about ditching fossil fuels and pursuing cleaner methods of energy generation.