It’s official, the UK just experienced its warmest year on record

London: The UK just experienced its warmest year, with nine per cent more sunshine than normal but less rain than average.

The Met Office said the UK’s ten hottest years had now occurred this millennium.

A child cycles on parched grass from the lack of rain in Greenwich Park in the UK.Credit:AP

And despite its international reputation as a country with bleak and rainy weather, this year was the tenth driest on record and total rainfall was well below average with the south of England receiving three-quarters of the rain normally expected.

The UK experienced its hottest-ever recorded summer temperature, for the first time ever, above 40 degrees Celsius in July, sparking a surge of fires in the capital. But it wasn’t just summer, every month except December, which began with a freak cold snap and heavy snow in London, was warmer than average.

New Year’s Day began with a record-high temperature of 16.3 degrees, setting the tone of the rest of the year.

The year smashed records as the warmest according to the Central England temperature series which dates back to 1659 and is the world’s longest record of temperature.

The scorching summer meant the UK set a new 139-year annual mean temperature, exceeding the last record of 9.88 degrees Celsius which was set in 2014.

The mean, which is the average of total temperatures, divided by the total number of temperatures recorded, shows the overall trend over time.

The final figure won’t be confirmed until the end of the year but as it currently stands, will certainly exceed the previous record, and is likely to be around 10 degrees.

Mark McCarthy from the Met Office’s national climate information centre, said it was the result of climate change.

“The warm year is in line with the genuine impacts we expect as a result of human-induced climate change. Although it doesn’t mean every year will be the warmest on record, climate change continues to increase the chances of increasingly warm years over the coming decades.”

And he said the cold snap experienced at the start of December, when thick snow blanketed London and plummeted to a low of -17.3 at Braemar, in Scotland, would become less frequent.

“Our climate is still subject to notable cold spells during the winter season, but our observational data show these have generally become less frequent and less severe as our climate warms,” McCarthy said.

However, one consequence of the warmer weather was the nine per cent more sunshine that Brits enjoyed.

The Met Office has previously warned that 2023 will be even warmer and as well as being the tenth conservative year that the global temperature is above 1 degree celsius above average.

Governments have agreed to limit global warming to less than 1.5 degrees, but critics say the promise is out of step with the use of fossil fuels that emit carbon emissions that contribute to climate change.

The war in Ukraine and the reduction in usage of Russian gas have also seen European countries that committed to net-zero turn to coal-fired power to try and make up for shortfalls.

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