Ag Weather Forum

Planet Earth is on pace for one of the five warmest years in recorded history, with a 60% chance of ranking as the warmest year on record. Those assessments are two of the highlights in the June World Climate Report from the National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI), a division of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).

For the month of June, the NOAA/NCEI report noted that the global surface temperature was 2.20 degrees Fahrenheit (1.22 degrees Celsius) above the 20th-century average of 59.9 degrees F (15.5 degrees C), making it the warmest June on record and the 13th consecutive month of record-high global temperatures.

For the first six months of the year (January to June), the global surface temperature was 2.32 degrees F (1.29 degrees C) above the 20th-century average, making it the warmest such period on record. In more detail, South America, Europe and Africa each had their warmest year-to-date period, with North America its second warmest on record. This unrelenting warming leads to this comment on world temperatures in the NOAA/NCEI report: "According to NCEI's Global Annual Temperature Outlook, there is almost a 60% chance that 2024 will rank as the warmest year on record and a 100% chance that it will rank in the top five."

For the month of June, the report notes that temperatures were above average across most of the global land surface except for Western Canada, most of Greenland, southern South America, northwestern Russia, eastern Asia, eastern Australia and much of eastern Antarctica. Africa, Asia and South America each had their warmest June on record while Europe had its second warmest. Sea surface temperatures were above average over most areas, while parts of the tropical eastern Pacific and southeastern Pacific were below average. The global oceans have had record-warm temperatures since April 2023.

The surface is not the only atmosphere sector with this pervasive heat. In the mid-troposphere (2-6 miles above the Earth's surface), temperatures were record high in June, according to satellite data from the National Environmental Satellite, Data and Information Service (NESDIS). Each of the past 12 months set global records for the mid-troposphere.

Snow cover and sea ice melted with global warmth. Northern Hemisphere snow cover extent in June was the 12th smallest on record. Both Eurasia and North America were below average (by 310,000 and 290,000 square miles, respectively). "In general, snow cover was below average over most areas except for parts of western Siberia and small parts of China, Pakistan and far-western Canada, which were above-average," the report said.

Also, the global sea ice extent was the second smallest in the 46-year record at 8.75 million square miles, which was 810,000 square miles below the 1991-to-2020 average. Arctic sea ice extent was below average (by 150,000 square miles), and Antarctic sea ice extent was also below average (by 660,000 square miles), ranking second lowest on record.

The report also noted that tropical cyclone activity in June was below the 1991-2020 average with two named tropical systems. However, they were significant in their impact on the mainland U.S. Both cyclones -- Tropical Storm Alberto and Hurricane Beryl -- originated in the Atlantic Basin. Remnants of Tropical Storm Alberto contributed to extensive flooding in the northwestern Midwest. And Hurricane Beryl made history as the earliest Category 5 Atlantic hurricane on record. Beryl caused extensive and severe damage to the Windward Islands in the Caribbean Sea, along with severe storms and flooding from the U.S. Gulf Coast through the Midwest and Northeast from its remnants.

The full NOAA/NCEI report is available here: https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/…

Bryce Anderson can be reached at Bryce.Anderson@dtn.com

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