The summer of 2023 was the hottest summer in the Northern Hemisphere since the height of the Roman Empire, a new study finds.
The summer of 2023 was the hottest summer in the Northern Hemisphere since the height of the Roman Empire, a new study finds.
While scientists had already determined that last summer was the hottest on record, modern record-keeping only dates back to the 19th century. For the new study, researchers wanted to look back further into the past.
By analyzing tree rings, which keep a history of past temperatures, they found the summer of 2023 was the warmest in more than 2,000 years. With climate change and El Niño pushing heat to new extremes, last summer measured 2.20 degrees C (3.96 degrees F) warmer than the preindustrial average, and 3.93 degrees C (7.07 degrees F) warmer than the coldest summer seen in the past two millennia. The findings were published in the journal Nature.
Read more at Yale Environment 360
Image: This map shows how much warmer, in degrees Celsius, the Earth was in the summer of 2023 as compared to the average summer from 1951 to 1980. (Credit: LAUREN DAUPHIN / NASA EARTH OBSERVATORY)
