{"id":763522,"date":"2026-06-27T10:32:14","date_gmt":"2026-06-27T10:32:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/763522\/"},"modified":"2026-06-27T10:32:14","modified_gmt":"2026-06-27T10:32:14","slug":"climate-change-the-culprit-for-europes-most-severe-heatwave-report-climate-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/763522\/","title":{"rendered":"Climate change the culprit for Europe\u2019s \u2018most severe\u2019 heatwave: Report | Climate News"},"content":{"rendered":"

The extreme June temperatures would have been \u2018virtually impossible\u2019 50 years ago, says the World Weather Attribution group.<\/p>\n

Published On 26 Jun 202626 Jun 2026<\/p>\n

The historic heatwave gripping Europe is part of a dangerous weather trend<\/a> that can only be explained by human-caused climate change, scientists have said.<\/p>\n

The extreme temperatures sweeping across much of Europe <\/a>mark the region\u2019s \u201cmost severe\u201d heatwave ever tracked for the month, and would have been \u201cvirtually impossible\u201d half a century ago, the World Weather Attribution group of scientists said in a report released on Friday.<\/p>\n

Recommended Stories list of 3 itemsend of list<\/p>\n

Millions in France, Italy, Spain, the United Kingdom and elsewhere in Europe have been experiencing blazing heat this week, with daytime temperatures topping 40 degrees Celsius<\/a> (104 Fahrenheit) in many places.<\/p>\n

The heatwave was reported on Friday to be moving eastwards, threatening Germany and central Europe with similar conditions to those which killed dozens in the western reaches of the continent, strained medical services and stressed the economy.<\/p>\n

The World Weather Attribution estimated that a heatwave with similar characteristics occurring in the climate of June 1976 \u2013 when Europe was also hit by persistently high temperatures \u2013 would have been about 3.5 degrees Celsius cooler.<\/p>\n

During another episode in 2003, temperatures would have been about 2 degrees Celsius cooler, the research suggests.<\/p>\n

The analysis shows that intense heat is increasing rapidly, even within living memory, \u201cwith such events tens to hundreds of times more likely since only 2003 and virtually impossible just 50 years ago,\u201d the study says.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis event would not have been possible in June without climate change,\u201d the study\u2019s lead author, Theodore Keeping from Imperial College London, told reporters.<\/p>\n

Phasing out fossil fuels \u2018critical\u2019<\/p>\n

The planet has warmed about 1.4C above pre-industrial times, driven by the burning of coal, oil and gas.<\/p>\n

Scientists agree this is making extreme weather events like heatwaves more frequent and intense, and that limiting warming is vital to avoid the worst impacts of climate change.<\/p>\n

Of the nearly 850 cities the World Weather Attribution\u2019s study analysed in Europe, some 45 percent had broken \u2013 or were expected to break \u2013 their all-time heat stress records in June.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe weather pattern itself is not particularly unusual, but the temperatures are \u2013 or at least they used to be without human-induced climate change,\u201d said Friederike Otto, the cofounder of World Weather Attribution.<\/p>\n

The June heatwave in Europe is the second such episode this year. An early-season period of heat in May<\/a> brought temperatures more typical of high summer to central and western parts of the continent.<\/p>\n

World Weather Attribution said the rapid phase-out of fossil fuels is \u201ccritical if we are to avoid even higher temperatures and their consequences in the future\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The extreme June temperatures would have been \u2018virtually impossible\u2019 50 years ago, says the World Weather Attribution group.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":763523,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[64,63,6045,7961,75,2057,44,128],"class_list":["post-763522","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-environment","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-climate","tag-climate-crisis","tag-environment","tag-europe","tag-news","tag-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/763522","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=763522"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/763522\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/763523"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=763522"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=763522"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=763522"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}