Western Europe experienced its warmest June-July period on record, with heat and drought fuelling extreme wildfires across the region, the European Union's Copernicus Climate Change Service said on Monday.
"Climate change is increasingly bringing the kinds of hot and dry conditions that favour large, high-intensity wildfires in southern Europe while extending the fire season northwards," Laurence Rouil, director of the Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service, said in a statement.
Here are some more details from the report:
- Globally, July temperatures were 1.47 degrees Celsius above the estimated pre-industrial 1850-1900 average, making it the second-warmest month on record.
- Average June-July temperature for western Europe reached 21.62 C - or 2.79 C above average - surpassing the previous 2022 record.
- Sea surface temperature was the highest recorded for July across the extra-polar oceans, partly fuelled by developing El Niño conditions in the equatorial Pacific.
- Exceptionally low rainfall and soil moisture led to much lower than average river levels in Europe, with the Seine, Rhine and Danube particularly impacted.
- Critically low levels at major waterways have prompted companies and households to curb electricity use as power plants shut down or lowered output while cargo traffic was increasingly restrained.