Record Sea Heat in Europe Linked to Climate Change

This summer, Europe’s seas experienced record heat, with the Mediterranean's average temperature hitting 27 degrees Celsius in July, the highest for that month. An offshore buoy near Mallorca recorded 33 degrees Celsius in early August.

The World Weather Attribution (WWA) analysis indicates that human-caused climate change has added approximately 2 degrees Celsius of warming to the Mediterranean and about 1.4 degrees Celsius to Western European seas. Claire Bergin, a climate scientist at Maynooth University and co-author of the study, stated that the extreme sea temperatures observed this year would not have occurred without human influence.

The analysis also revealed that marine heatwave conditions impacted around 90% of the Bay of Biscay and 80% of the western Mediterranean. John Bruno, a marine ecologist at the University of North Carolina, noted that while some marine species are migrating northward in search of cooler waters, not all can adapt.

The World Meteorological Organization reported that greenhouse gas emissions have raised global average temperatures to about 1.4 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels.