With the start of each new year, we start hearing reports on how the twelve months we just completed stack up against all the cycles of twelve months that came before. One of the more unfortunate metrics that has been in the news in our Earth’s temperature. According to newly released NASA data, 2020 was tied with 2016 as the warmest year on record and was on average 1.8 degrees Fahrenheit or 1.02 degrees Celcius warmer than the baseline from 1951 to 1980.

There are a lot of ways for a world to be warmer on average and some places will see a change of more than just one degree. What we’re observing is that some places are several degrees warmer while others are a couple of degrees cooler, and where those warmer and cooler places are located really matters. When it’s the ocean that gets heated, we see bigger hurricanes and more melting sea ice.

It’s hard to fathom how much energy the ocean can store. In 2020 alone, it is estimated the oceans absorbed enough heat to boil between 65 million and 1.3 billion kettles of water, depending on the model the scientists use and the size of your kettle. We saw that energy shaping our world with the accelerated melting of Greenland’s glaciers and Antarctic ice and the supercharging of tropical storms. 

Currently, a massive piece of the Antarctic Larsen Ice Shelf is grinding toward South Georgia Island, which is home to penguins, sea lions, and a multitude of critters that must have access to open water to find food. There is significant concern that as this melting iceberg tries to make landfall, it could block access to the ocean for these animals. It’s hoped it will run aground far enough out to leave access to the sea, but right now, all we know for certain is that rising temperatures are reshaping our world as ice moves, storms change our coastlines, and the habitats for plants and animals move poleward.

As exciting as it is scientifically to see a world so rapidly changing, this is all so much to understand as someone who lives on this changing planet. If we don’t want to see more radical changes, we – all humans on this planet – are going to need to do our best to reduce the release of greenhouse gases. Our individual choices matter, but the biggest impacts come from industrial pollution, and with the U.S. expected to rejoin the Paris Agreement on Wednesday, it is easier to hope that we can succeed in reducing the rate at which the world’s temperatures will rise.

More Information

NASA press release

Science News article

“Upper Ocean Temperatures Hit Record High in 2020,” Lijing Cheng et al., 2021 January 13, Advances in Atmospheric Sciences