The UK Met Office has predicted that 2013 will be another scorcher, saying that it will be one of the warmed years on record, with the global average temperature expected to be around 0.57 degrees higher than the long-term average.
As part of its annual forecast for the coming year the Met Office stated that, "it is very likely that 2013 will be one of the warmest 10 years in the record which goes back to 1850, and it is likely to be warmer than 2012."
The forecast has been made based upon research by the Met Office, the University of East Anglia, NASSA's Goddard Institute of Space Studies, and the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
Dave Britton, a forecaster at the Met Office, told Reuters that the rising temperatures could be due to both a natural variability of the climate, and also global warming due to increasing greenhouse gas emissions.
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According to the World Meteorological Organisation eleven of the twelve hottest years on record have occurred since 2001. 2011 was the warmest ever, having been 0.54 degrees above the long term average, and 2012 has been the ninth warmest, being 0.45 degrees above the average.
Low-lying islands, such as the Maldives, have been urging developed countries to cut their carbon emissions and work to keep the global temperature rise to less than 2 degrees this century. However a leaked report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change suggested that average temperatures could rise by more than 2 degrees by 2100, maybe even as much as 4.8 degrees.
By. Charles Kennedy of Oilprice.com
Charles is a writer for Oilprice.com More
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