The emissions fall, but the average global temperature continues to rise

Although the emissions of carbon dioxide are directly attributable to the use of fossil fuels have remained broadly stable in 2015 (compared to 2014), and have grown only slightly in 2016, the current year is on track to become (the new) " warmest year ever, "or at least since the temperatures are collected and recorded scientifically, ie more or less by the end of the 800.

Indeed, some have estimated the probability at 95% - almost a certainty: it is the allegations of the WMO (World Meteorological Organization) in its most recent publication, Provisional WMO Statement on the Status of the Global Climate in 2016 (in English).

If the estimate whereabouts then confirmed by the facts, the average temperature of the year may be about 1.2 ° C above the average temperature that you had before the Industrial Revolution.

If it were, we would have that 16 of the 17 years they have most ever recorded occurred warm during this century (the 17th is 1998), highlighted the WMO.

The new record (1.2 ° C) is already more than half way to the 2 degree Celsius limit average global warming, laboriously established over the last International Climate Conference (COP21, Paris 2015) and which do not it should arrive, if you do not want to incur dramatic climate scenarios.

BEYOND PREDICTION. "Another year, another record: the maximum recorded in 2015 were sold in 2016," said the secretary general of the WMO, Petteri Taalas.

Of course we must also put the consequences of El Niño, a periodic climate phenomenon that has always played a key role on the temperature and that on this occasion, between 2015 and 2016, it has shown a particularly strong influence. On some areas of the Russian Arctic temperatures they were consistently 6-7 degrees Celsius higher than average, and some arctic and subarctic regions of Alaska and Canada have experienced constant temperatures of 3 ° C above average.

The same is true for 90 percent of the land areas of the northern hemisphere (with the exception of the tropics), where temperatures of at least one degree centigrade above the average are recorded.

In recent weeks, a Pacific Ocean cooling is noticed: index that El Niño is definitely over and that could instead be felt La Niña with a general lowering of the temperature. In the coming months we will understand how the two phenomena may have influenced the growth and decreasing temperature.