Climate change made this summer’s heatwave 30 times more likely than it would have been under natural conditions, the Met Office has said.
This summer was the equal warmest in a series dating back to 1910, along with 2006, 2003 and 1976, with temperatures reaching a peak of 35.6C, recorded at Felsham, Suffolk, on 27 July.
An analysis from the Met Office found the record-breaking summer temperatures were around 30 times more likely as a result of climate change brought about by human activities.
The UK now has around a 12 per cent chance of summer average temperatures being as high as they were in 2018, whereas it would have less than 0.5 per cent chance of that happening in a “natural” climate, the Met Office said.
The study follows climate projections published last week in which the Met Office said there would be a 50 per cent chance of summers as hot as 2018’s heatwave by mid century, making the exceptional temperatures the norm.
Sweltering summer temperatures and dry weather this year hit crops and livestock, affected water supplies, transport networks, people’s health and the natural environment, and led to numerous wildfires.
Professor Peter Stott, from the Met Office and University of Exeter, said: “Our provisional study compared computer models based on today’s climate with those of the natural climate we would have had without human-induced emissions.
“We find that the intensity of this summer’s heatwave is around 30 times more likely than would have been the case without climate change.”
He added: “This rapidly increasing chance results from the increase in concentrations of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.”
Carbon dioxide concentrations in the atmosphere reached 405.5 parts per million (ppm) in 2017, about 146 per cent of levels seen in the pre-industrial era, when concentrations of the gas which warms the climate were around 280ppm.
The Met Office is announcing the findings at the UN climate talks in Poland, where countries are meeting to finalise the rules of how the Paris Agreement on tackling global warming will work and to build momentum towards increasing ambition on efforts to cut greenhouse gas emissions.
“The link between climate change and extreme weather like the heatwave that scorched the UK last summer is getting stronger,” Greenpeace UK executive director John Sauven said.
“It used to be a fingerprint, it now looks more like a smoking gun. If we stay on the current course, we know the kind of world we’re heading towards: more floods, heatwaves, droughts, and rising sea levels.”
He said the window of opportunity to avoid dangerous climate change was “still open, but only just”, and called on politicians to take action, including by replacing fossil fuels with renewables, cutting emissions from homes and cars, and halting destruction of the rainforests.
Official statistics released earlier this year show hundreds of extra deaths were recorded in England as a result of the heatwave.
As temperatures rose above 30C in the last week of June, 382 more deaths occurred than average, and 243 more than average were observed during unseasonably warm temperatures in April.
Satellite pictures also captured the impact the heatwave and drought had on the UK’s appearance, showing contrasting images of how the country turned from green to brown.
Additional reporting by PA
