Japan’s national weather agency has recently announced that the country has experienced its hottest spring on record. The average temperatures for March, April, and May were 1.59 degrees Celsius higher than the long-term average, making this the warmest spring since comparable data began to be collected in 1898.
The agency ascribed this warmth to a combination of greenhouse gases and the El Nino phenomenon. The increasing incidence of record-breaking temperatures is a direct consequence of global warming and is expected to become more frequent in the future.
Average sea-surface temperatures around Japan during these months were among the third-highest recorded since 1982. Recent reports from the United Nations (UN) suggest a high likelihood that the five-year period from 2023 to 2027 will be the warmest ever documented.
The UN’s World Meteorological Organisation also issued a warning that there is a two-thirds chance that at least one of the next five years will exceed the more ambitious target outlined in the Paris Agreement. Climate scientists have underscored that global warming is intensifying adverse weather conditions, including heavy rainfall.
As the current president of the Group of Seven (G7), Japan has pledged to expedite the phase-out of fossil fuels. However, the recent G7 summit failed to establish new deadlines for the cessation of polluting power sources such as coal.
