You can’t say the 2022 climate data coming out is surprising. But it sure is alarming.
U.S. federal agencies last week reported that 2022 was either the fifth- or sixth-hottest year on record, depending on the accounting method used. The 10 warmest years over the last 143 years have all occurred since 2010. Another study showed the amount of heat being taken up by Earth’s oceans reached another record high last year.
Meanwhile, the pollution that causes global warming just keeps rising. U.S. greenhouse gas emissions increased by about 1.3% in 2022 compared with the previous year, according to an analysis by the research firm Rhodium Group, marking the second year in a row that planet-warming pollution has gone up after declining earlier in the COVID-19 pandemic.
