2012 is but the Latest Year Marked by Heat and Drought

With its heatwaves and drought, the summer of 2012 has been hot. In fact, the Northeast has experienced the hottest period from January to July ever recorded and July 2012 was the hottest month ever in the contiguous US. Although the weather has been balmy this year, extreme heat and drought are not anything new.

According to an EPA report, seven of the top ten warmest years on record for the continental U.S. have occurred since 1990. The frequency of heat waves have also steadily risen since the 1960’s and the percentage of the US population experiencing heat waves has also increased. Perhaps most convincing is the fact that seventeen of the warmest years in recorded history have occurred over the last twenty years and the warmest years on record occurred in the most recent decade.

Heat in the US Northeast and Drought Around the World

Against a backdrop of wildfires and droughts, heat records are being broken across the US but nowhere more than in the Northeast. After a winter with very little snow, people in the Northeast have been subjected to record breaking heat for the first seven months of 2012. The period between July 2011 to July 2012 was also the warmest 12-months in the Northeast ever recorded. The weather is making headlines across the nation with more than half of the country suffering from high temperatures and little rain. The drought is driving up the cost of agricultural commodities and contributing to price volatility, they may even lead to a food crisis. Although it is abnormally dry in the Northeast, they have escaped drought conditions, what they cannot escape is heat.

Christiana Figueres on UNCCD World Day to Combat Desertification and Rio+20

Desertification (Video)