[D66] Summer's second heatwave set to break records across Europe

[A.OUT]

Summer's second heatwave set to break records across Europe
By
Jon Henley European affairs
theguardian.com
3 min
View Original

All-time temperature records are set to be broken in major cities across
Europe on Thursday as the second extreme heatwave in consecutive months
to be linked by scientists to the climate emergency grips the continent.

“The most extreme heat will build from central and northern France into
Belgium, the Netherlands and far-western Germany” from Wednesday, said
Eric Leister of the forecasting group AccuWeather.

After several cities in France recorded their highest ever temperatures
on Tuesday, including Bordeaux which hit 41.2C, the national weather
service Metéo France said Paris was predicted to beat its all-time high
of 40.4C – set in July 1947 – on Thursday with a forecast 42C.

Highs exceeding 38C and 39C in Amsterdam and Brussels could also
threaten records in those cities, national forecasters said, with the
all-time Dutch and Belgian records of 38.6C, set in August 1944, and
38.8C, set in June 1947, also likely to fall.

The current heatwave, caused by an “omega block”, a high-pressure
pattern that blocks and diverts the jet stream, allowing a mass of hot
air to flow up from northern Africa and the Iberian peninsula, follows a
similar extreme weather event last month which made it the hottest June
on record.

The highest June temperatures ever were recorded in the Czech Republic,
Slovakia, Austria, Andorra, Luxembourg, Poland and Germany, while France
registered its highest ever temperature of 45.9C in the southern commune
of Gallargues-le-Montueux.

Clare Nullis, a World Meteorological Organization spokeswoman, said the
heatwaves bore “the hallmark of climate change”. The extreme events were
“becoming more frequent, they’re starting earlier and they’re becoming
more intense,” Nullis said. “It’s not a problem that’s going to go away.”

The 26-28 June heatwave in France was 4C hotter than a June heatwave
would have been in 1900, according to World Weather Attribution, a new
international programme helping the scientific community to analyse the
possible influence of climate change on extreme weather events.

A study published earlier this year by the Swiss Federal Institute of
Technology in Zürich said last year’s summer heatwave across northern
Europe would have been “statistically impossible” without climate change
driven by human activity.

Cities are particularly vulnerable in heatwaves because of a phenomenon
known as the urban heat island, in which concrete buildings and asphalt
roads absorb heat during the day and emit it at again night, preventing
the city from ever cooling.

The Dutch KNMI weather service has has issued a code orange extreme
temperature warning for everywhere except the offshore Wadden Islands
and implemented its “national heat emergency” plan, while Belgium has
taken the unprecedented step of placing the entire country on a code red
warning.

Spain has also declared a red alert in the Zaragoza region, hit by its
worst wildfires in 20 years last month. The EU’s Copernicus Emergency
Management Service warned of an “extreme danger” of further forest fires
in France and Spain on Thursday, with a “high” or “very high” threat
level in Portugal, Italy, Belgium and Germany.

Météo France said the conditions “require particular care, notably for
vulnerable or exposed people”. Britain’s Met Office issued similar
advice and said the UK all-time high of 38.5C, recorded in Faversham,
Kent, in August 2003, could also be exceeded on Thursday.

Local authorities in France have placed restrictions on water usage in
73 out of the country’s 96 départements following dramatic falls in
ground and river water levels. “It’s tricky but under control, but we
need to be very vigilant,” the junior environment minister, Emmanuelle
Wargon, said.

The French energy giant EDF said it was shutting down two reactors at
its Golfech nuclear power plant in the southern Tarn-et-Garonne region
in order to limit the heating of water used to keep the reactors cool.

Scientists have said such heatwaves are closely linked to the climate
emergency and will be many times more likely over the coming decades.

The Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research said last month that
Europe’s five hottest summers since 1500 had all occurred in the 21st
century, in 2018, 2010, 2003, 2016 and 2002.

Monthly records were now falling five times as often as they would in a
stable climate, the institute said, adding this was “a consequence of
global warming caused by the increasing greenhouse gases from burning
coal, oil and gas”.
Start your day with a summary of top stories and must-reads from the
Guardian emailed directly to you. Sign up now.