Fever chart: Earth had its hottest decade on record in 2010s
Associated PressWASHINGTON — The decade that just ended was by far the hottest ever measured on Earth, capped off by the second-warmest year on record, two U.S. agencies reported Wednesday. Five other global teams of monitoring scientists agreed, based on temperature readings taken on Earth’s surface, while various satellite-based measurements said it was anywhere from the hottest year on record to the third-hottest. “It’s sobering to think that we might be breaking global temperature records in quick succession,” said Georgia Tech climate scientist Kim Cobb. “2020 is off to a horrifying climate start, and I fear what the rest of the year will bring to our doorsteps.” NASA’s Schmidt said that overall, Earth is now about 1.2 degrees C hotter since the beginning of the industrial age, a number that is important because in 2015 global leaders adopted a goal of preventing 1.5 C of warming since the rise of big industry in the mid- to late 1800s. “Human-caused climate change is responsible for the long-term warming — it’s responsible for why the 2010s were warmer than 2000s, which were warmer than the 1990s, etc.,” Texas A&M University climate scientist Andrew Dessler said in an email.