“The global average annual temperature in 2024 was approximately 1.55 ° C above the pre -industrial average level of 1850-1900. At the same time, warming in Europe is faster than on other continents of the planet, experts note. Almost half of the continent, were recorded recordly high annual temperatures,” the material said.
The speakers drew attention to the “striking contrast of climatic conditions between the east and the West of Europe”: in the east it was extremely dry, and in the west it was wet.
“Most of Eastern Europe was the usual land, and the eastern part of Ukraine and individual regions of the south-west of Russia survived the most dry year in the history of observations,” the authors said.
Last year, in particular, 60% of the territory of Europe (with the exception of Greenland and Spitsbergen) experienced “more than on average”, the number of days with at least “strong thermal stress”, when the temperature feels 32 ° C or higher.
The report emphasizes that in 2024, Europe lost the ice almost everywhere, and on the glaciers of Scandinavia and Spitzbergen the pace of loss of their mass turned out to be the highest in the entire history of observations.
“In general, over the year, the temperature of the sea surface in the European region was the highest in the history of observations – 0.7 ° C higher than the average indicator. The highest annual temperature of the sea surface, which significantly exceeded the previous record set in 2023, was recorded in the Mediterranean Sea. Higher sea surface temperatures were associated with sea waves, which have a destructive effect on the destructive effect on Oceanic ecosystems and biodiversity, and therefore, can also have socio-economic consequences, ”says WMO.
