This just in, July 3rd, 2023, now holds the dubious honor of being the hottest day ever documented in our planet’s history. We may as well call it “Scorching Monday.”
Setting a new and terrifying record, the average global temperature clocked in at 17.01C (62.62F), inching past the August 2016 record of 16.92C (62.46F). This data, sourced from the United States National Centers for Environmental Prediction, shows just how blistering hot our Earth has become. And don’t think for a second that it’s just us in the hotter regions feeling the heat, it’s reaching even the planet’s most frigid corners.
Eliot Jacobson, a retired professor, took to Twitter to share a graphic from ClimateReanalyzer.org. The image was chilling, illustrating how above-freezing temperatures were touching the coast of Antarctica, right near the Thwaites glacier. The icy poles aren’t so icy anymore, and that’s terrifying.
This relentless heat, this unyielding change, is an effect of our insatiable consumption of fossil fuels. The never-ending pumping of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere is tipping our climate scales. If we don’t put a stop to these emissions, we’re set to face a cascade of calamities.
From blistering heatwaves to wild infernos, from suffocating air pollution to catastrophic floods and ruthless storms, climate change is here and it’s real. As Global Climate and Health Alliance Executive Director Jeni Miller puts it, “The extraction and use of coal, oil, and gas harm people’s health, are the primary driver of warming, and are incompatible with a healthy climate future.”
Climate change isn’t just about the weather. It’s also about our food sources, our health, and our very homes. Crop losses are escalating. Infectious diseases are spreading more rapidly. People are being forced to leave their homes and migrate.
And this is not just about us, humans. It’s about our entire ecosystem. As per Friederike Otto, a climate scientist at Britain’s Grantham Institute for Climate Change and the Environment, an overly warm Earth is essentially “a death sentence for people and ecosystems.”
So, it’s high time our governments take this threat seriously. The upcoming Cop28 needs to be a game-changer. We need a commitment to phase out all fossil fuels and a just transition to renewable energy for all.
While this news is dire, it should also be a wake-up call. Let’s hope this record-breaking temperature prompts some record-breaking changes in our approach to climate change. Because it’s not just the Earth that’s heating up, so is the urgency to act.
