August 2, 2016

In 2015, the frequencies of extremely warm days and nights were the highest ever recorded in western North America, parts of central Europe, and central Asia. The year broke the record for the highest number of extremely warm days in the 66-year record (1.8 times more than the average).

In the 2015 edition of the State of the Climate report, climate and biology experts wrote about some dramatic impacts of warming on life in the ocean.

2015 was a tough year for vegetation, both natural and agricultural, with a near-record area of global land surfaces in some state of drought.

A record-smashing hurricane season in the central North Pacific. Water rationing in Puerto Rico. The biggest one-year jump in atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations. These and more of 2015's extreme events had one thing in common: El Niño.

Using measurements taken worldwide, scientists estimated that 2015’s global average carbon dioxide concentration was 399.4 parts per million (ppm), a new record high. At Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawai’i, where atmospheric carbon dioxide has been recorded longer than anywhere else in the world, the annual average carbon dioxide concentration was 400.8—also a new record, and a new milestone.

In 2015, glaciers across the globe, on average, continued to shrink for the 36th consecutive year.

Ocean heat storage has increased substantially since 1993, hitting a record high in 2015, according to the State of the Climate in 2015 report. Ocean warming accounts for over 90% of the warming in Earth’s climate system.

The author of the glacier chapter of the 2015 State of the Climate report and his daughter talk about how family connections brought them together scientifically, and how science keeps bringing their family together.

A new study published in Environmental Research Letters shows that scientists could use the Gulf of Mexico’s sea surface temperature (SST) to forecast whether atmospheric conditions are favorable