Europe experiences hottest summer in recorded history

This year’s heat waves and subsequent droughts resulted in the hottest summer in recorded European history, according to a report by the Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) – an EU-funded Earth observation agency.

In its findings, which were published on Thursday, the C3S notes that average temperatures from June to August were 0.4 degrees Celsius above the previous hottest summer, which was recorded in 2021. Meanwhile, the temperatures in Europe in August beat the 2018 record by a whole 0.8 degrees Celsius.

The agency also notes that August of 2022 was much drier than average in large parts of Europe, while in much of Scandinavia and southern Europe conditions were predominantly wetter than average.

“We’ve not only had record August temperatures for Europe, but also for the summer, with the previous summer record only being one year old,” said Freja Vamborg, a senior scientist at the Copernicus Climate Change Service.

Meanwhile, this past August became the joint third warmest August on record globally, with the average temperature being 0.3 degrees Celsius higher than the 1991-2020 average for the month. 

EU Commission spokesperson Johannes Bahrke stated last month that this summer’s drought in Europe was the worst in at least the past 500 years, citing a report by the Joint Research Center, which suggested that 47% of Europe suffered a deficit of soil moisture.

The C3S has previously noted that the past seven years have been the hottest ever recorded in the world.