Temperature in Mexico is rising faster than the worldwide average

The National Water Commission (Conagua) presented its Climate Report in Mexico 2020 in a videoconference, in which it pointed out that the temperature in the country has increased by 1.4 degrees, higher than the rest of the planet, with an increase of 0.98 degrees worldwide.

“The temperature in Mexico has increased 1.4 degrees (in 2020) with respect to the reference period 1981-2010,” said the general coordinator of the National Meteorological Service (SMN), Jorge Zavala Hidalgo, who explained that “in that same period, the planet increased 0.98 degrees, that is, the temperature in the Mexico has been increasing faster than in the rest of the planet.”

According to the SMN, the global average temperature, two meters from the surface, placed 2020 as “the second warmest year in the historical record since 1880, with a positive anomaly of 0.98 degrees Celsius,” according to the State of the Climate report published by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO).

In the country, the national average temperature in 2020 was 22.4 degrees Celsius, which equaled the records of 2017 and 2019. These three years were the warmest since 1953, with 1.4 degrees Celsius above the average between 1981 and 2010.

In the Climate Report in Mexico, it is indicated that the warmest month was July, with an average of 26.7 degrees and it is the hottest July since 1953, while December was the coolest, with an average of 16.3 degrees nationwide.

This warm climate in Mexico is registered right in the middle of a climate emergency.

In 2020, Zavala Hidalgo said, ”we unfortunately had the most greenhouse gas concentrations, in particular carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide, which have continued to increase despite the fact that part of these gases are assimilated by the oceans and emissions reduction policies.”

It was noted that 80 percent of the oceans were affected by heatwaves, which favored the hurricane season to mark a record number (31 cyclones) in the Atlantic (and that affected Tabasco and Chiapas in Mexico with severe flooding ), and a record low will be reached in Arctic ice cover.

In her speech, the general director of Conagua, Blanca Jiménez Cisneros, highlighted that 2020 was a year not only affected by the coronavirus pandemic (COVID-19) but also by high cyclonic activity and extreme rains, in addition to stronger cold fronts.