Europe is the fastest-warming continent, Copernicus report warns, with devastating health impacts

Warming weather will impact health, nature and the economy, the report by WMO and Copernicus says.

Transcript

00:00Europe is warming more rapidly than any other continent, according to new research from

00:07Copernicus, the EU's climate monitoring service. 2023 was marked by unprecedented heat waves,

00:14fires and flooding. Overall, temperatures were 1.1 percent above average.

00:20We are already living in a climate that is fundamentally different from the climate our

00:24civilization evolved and our, as a people, grew up in. And this new climate is, you know,

00:32often we talk about uncharted territory because it's true. We have never seen the sea so warm

00:36or so high in our lifetime.

00:40Temperatures are rising at twice the global average. It's also much wetter, leading to

00:45a complex mix of extremes within the continent.

00:49If you look at Europe as a whole, in terms of precipitation, it was 7 percent above average

00:56as a whole. But that's a complex figure because while, you know, northern Germany or part

01:02of Scandinavia or even the Balkans have seen a rather wet year as a whole, or the British

01:11Isle for what it matters, if you look at Andalusia or Catalonia or southern France, then the

01:18situation was much, much dire.

01:23Scientists say that the extreme weather events will become more frequent and planning to

01:27cope with them all will be challenging.

01:31We expect there to be wilder swings, in fact, between hot and dry and wet conditions. So

01:39swings between wet and dry becoming wilder. And of course, this is really difficult to

01:45plan for because it's much easier to plan, you know, your infrastructure and the way

01:52society goes about its business, to have expected conditions over the year and to get even rainfall

01:58rather than coming in fits and starts.

02:02From rising sea temperatures to melting glaciers, Europe is witnessing the worst effects of

02:07global warming. The Copernicus researchers say that unless the trend is reversed, these

02:13impacts are only going to get worse.