The Corona year 2020 was one of the three hottest years since temperature records began in the middle of 19. Century. The World Weather Organization (WMO) confirmed December forecasts in Geneva on Thursday. The WMO reported that 2020 almost broke all previous records. Only the naturally occurring cooling weather phenomenon La Niña caused a slight cooling at the very end of the year.

The global average temperature was 14, 9 ° C, 1.2 ° above the pre-industrial level (1850 to 1900), with an error margin of 0.1 °. The three hottest years were thus 2016, 2019 and 2020. Nominally 2016 was warmer, said WMO spokeswoman Clare Nullis. In view of the margin of error, it is practically impossible to differentiate between the three years. The WMO points out that 2016 was characterized by a strong weather phenomenon El Niño, which, in contrast to La Niña, has a warming effect. “We are on the way to catastrophic warming of 3 to 5 ° this century,” said UN Secretary General António Guterres. “To make peace with nature is the main task in the 21. Century.”

Waning trade winds El Niño and La Niña occur every few years. At El Niño, the tropical trade winds subside and this weakens the usual buoyancy of cooler water off the west coast of South America. La Niña mostly follows El Niño and is accompanied by stronger trade winds, which ensure cooler surface water off the coast of Peru. Both phenomena have practically worldwide effects, including droughts and heavy rainfall depending on the region.

For its analysis, the WMO evaluated data from the US weather agency NOAA, the Goddard Institute of NASA, from the Hadley Center the British Meteorological Institute and the Research Unit of the British University of East Anglia, the European Center for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts and the Copernicus Earth Observation Program and the Japanese Meteorological Agency.

(anw )