Denial and 'Alternative Facts' haven’t stopped the Earth from Warming to Record-shattering Levels

We’re now breaking global temperature records once every three years 

 

February 2016 was the warmest February in 136 years of Nasa’s modern temperature records. Global temperature records were broken throughout 2016. Photograph: GISS/NASA 

According to NASA, in 2016 the Earth’s surface temperature shattered the previous record for hottest year set in 2015, which broke the previous record set in 2014, which  in turn had broken the previous record set in 2005.

Global temperature wasn’t the only record-setter in 2016. Global warming causes climate change, and North America saw its highest number of storms and floods in over four decades. Globally, we saw over 1.5 times more extreme weather catastrophes in 2016 than the average over the past 30 years. Global sea ice cover plunged to a record low as well. California endured a fifth consecutive year of its worst drought in over a millennium. A drought also savaged the maize harvest in Southern Africa, causing a famine. The list of climate consequences goes on.

Read more at The Guardian

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National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Data:
2016 was the warmest year in the 137-year series compiled by NOAA (graph, below). Sixteen of the 17 warmest years on record occurred in the consecutive years 2001 through 2016. The five warmest years have all occurred since 2010.