2019 Second Warmest Year on Record: NOAA and NASA
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  • Writer's pictureKyle Sooley-Brookings

2019 Second Warmest Year on Record: NOAA and NASA


Analyses from NOAA and NASA says that 2019 was the second warmest year on record since modern recordkeeping began in 1880.


Temperatures from 2019 were second only to those of 2016 and continued the planet's long-term warming trend: the past five years have been the warmest of the last 140 years.


This past year, they were 1.8 degrees Fahrenheit (0.98 degrees Celsius) warmer than the 1951 to 1980 mean, according to scientists at NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) in New York.


Since the 1880s, the average global surface temperature has risen and the average temperature is now more than 2 degrees Fahrenheit (a bit more than 1 degree Celsius) above that of the late 19th century. For reference, the last Ice Age was about 10 degrees Fahrenheit colder than pre-industrial temperatures.


This increase mostly has been driven by increased emissions into the atmosphere of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases produced by human activities.

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