The hottest summer of our lives

David Leonhardt

“It’s almost as if the entire East Coast has shifted south,” said David Leonhardt. As “the cascading effects of climate change” become more apparent with every passing month, average summer high temperatures in cities from Portland, Maine, to Atlanta are climbing 3 to 4 degrees, and are coming to resemble those of cities hundreds of miles to the south. Portland’s July average temperature, 78 degrees in 1970, has risen to Boston’s old average in the low 80s, while Boston’s is now like New York City’s, which has become like Philadelphia’s a decade ago, while Philly’s average of nearly 90 is like Washington, D.C.’s old average. The nation’s capital is now hotter than Atlanta, and both cities now have Tampa’s old July average in the low 90s. The same phenomenon is occurring in Mountain West cities like Billings, Mont., Denver, and Salt Lake City; in Montana and Idaho, daily highs topped 100 degrees this week. This summer is on track to be the hottest on record, and “the extreme heat is creating situations that are a mix of unnatural and horrific,” with dozens of wildfires now exploding throughout the West. Climate change is already making our weather more uncomfortable and more dangerous—and our future increasingly precarious.