Paris’ record high temperature may fall as another heat wave roasts Europe
Another stifling heat wave is on tap this week for large portions of Europe, including most of France, Spain, Portugal, and Britain. Unlike the first heat wave that occurred at the end of June and into early July, this event is likely to also affect Scandinavia, which experienced extreme heat and a spate of related wildfires last year.
As of Monday morning, Meteo France was predicting that Paris’ all-time hottest temperature of 104.7 degrees, will fall on Thursday. The previous record has stood since 1947. Computer model projections show the heat wave, known in French as La Canicule, could last in Paris and much of the country through Friday.
Hot and dry conditions are driving the wildfire risk upwards particularly across Spain and Portugal, according to the Copernicus Climate Service in Europe.
The early summer heat wave set a national all-time high temperature record for France. Meteo France certified a record of 115 degrees, observed in Vérargues, located in southern France, as the country’s hottest temperature seen to date.
Unlike the previous heat wave this summer, this one will also envelop the United Kingdom, Met Office are warning of the possibility that all-time record high temperatures could be set through Thursday, particularly in central and eastern England where the heat will last the longest.
Today, locations in southeastern England could hit 93 degrees, including in London. By Thursday, the July high temperature record of 98 degrees, as well as the all-time U.K. temperature record of 101.3 degrees, could be tied or exceeded, the Met Office warns.
The previous all-time U.K. high temperature record was recorded in Faversham in 2003.
The new heat wave will also extend its reach into other parts of Europe, including Switzerland, Belgium, Germany, Denmark, Sweden and Norway, among other countries.
Extreme heat events in areas where many lack air conditioning, such as in metro London, Paris, Amsterdam and Berlin, can be a greater public health threat than similar events in areas with different infrastructure. However, heat waves occurring in mid-summer, when people have become more acclimated to warmer weather, can have a less severe public health impact than early-season events.
Climate science research shows that heat waves like this and more severe in many parts of the world, including Europe, as the overall climate warms due to human activities, primarily burning fossil fuels for energy.
For example, an analysis of the role that climate change may have played in the early-summer European heat event found that there has been “a very large increase” in the temperature of such heatwaves. The report, which has not been peer reviewed, found that a heat wave that intense is now occurring at least 10 times more frequently today compared to a century ago.
A groundbreaking climate study on a deadly European heat wave in 2003 found that human-caused climate change made that event twice as likely to occur, when compared to a climate without a human-caused increase in greenhouse gas concentrations.
Studies since then have broadened the detection of the human fingerprint on extreme heat. For example, a particularly expansive study in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences in 2017 showed that climate change has heightened the chances for record heat across more than 80 percent of the surface area of the globe with sufficient weather data available. (This study excluded parts of the developing world due to missing data.)