Two new findings on climate change [updated]

Two articles published in the last few days reveal a new twist in the magnitude of climate change.

(Image: nasa.gov)

This New York Times article reveals that 2014 has been the hottest year on record, with a bar chart showing evolution of temperature over last century. This article from Bloomberg goes further by animating superimposed monthly averages over 100 years, highlighting record years as they pass. You will see that the past 20 years have seen more record temperatures than the 80 years before then. The original publication (and the animation shown on this page) is from NASA/NOOA. Despite polar episodes and snow storms across the U.S., the warming trend is here to stay, and extreme weather such as draughts, super hot summers, violent storms, and cherry trees blooming in January (happened in 2013 in Atlanta) may become more common place.

To make matters worse, this Climate Central article reveals that sea level has been rising faster in recent years than initially thought. The authors of the study created a model that better captures contributions to sea level rise. The article raises the question about how this model will impact forecasts of sea levels in the future... no very reassuring to begin with.

These findings should serve as final warnings to those who are still skeptical about global warming. These articles might even try to tell us we have less time than initially thought to address climate change. Will we be up to the task?