With the second hottest December from 1800 to today, 2019 closed with an anomaly of +0.96˚C above the average, making it the fourth warmest year on record after 2014, 2015 and 2018.
According to Michele Brunetti, head of the historical climatology database of the Italian Research Council’s Institute of Climate and Atmospheric Science in Bologna, 2019 ended thus the hottest decade ever in Italy.
Extreme weather events have increased in Italy amid the climate crisis, hitting people and ecosystems harder and more frequently.
The phenomenon is not confined to Italy, and is reflected on a global scale.
According to data from the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO), the average temperature recorded between January and October 2019 was 1.1˚C higher than pre-industrial levels (between 1850 and 1900).
With this data at hand, scientists predicted that 2019 would be the second or third hottest year in recorded history, with 2016 still topping the charts.
Since the 1980s, every decade has been hotter than the one before, with an increase of 0.1˚C to 0.2˚C each time.
