Weather is already changing in Britain: Met Office
According to an annual climate report published by the Met Office, the climate in Britain is already changing as the country has had warmer, humid and sunny weather in recent decades than in the 20th century. The State of UK Climate, an annual publication that gives an up-to-date assessment of Britain’s climate, published that the year 2020 was the third warmest, fifth wettest and eighth warmest on record for the country. No other year ranked in the top 10 for all three variables for the UK.
The Met Office report warned that the country warmed at a broadly consistent but slightly higher rate than the observed change in global average temperatures.
The report said that, for Britain, the period 1991 to 2020 has been an average of 0.3 °C warmer than 1981 to 2010 and 0.9 °C warmer than 1961 to 1990, with all months and countries warmer.The report’s lead author, Mike Kendon, climate information scientist at the Met Office, said many people think climate change is in the future, but it proves that the climate in the UK is already changing.
Kendon said that, as it continues to warm, we’re going to see more and more extreme weather like heatwaves and flooding.
The report, based on observations of temperature, precipitation, sunlight and wind speed from the UK’s land weather station network managed by the Met Office and several key partners and cooperative volunteers, is published in the Journal of Climatology as a special issue of the International .
It aims to summarize the country’s weather and climate through the calendar year 2020, as well as provide historical context for a number of essential climate variables.
