Last year we covered over a number of months that they were the hottest in history, with November even exceeding 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels. As per Euronews.green, officials from C3S confirmed that 2023 was the hottest ever, surpassing 2016 by quite some margin, due to sky-rocketing temperatures post-June.

Samantha Burgess, Deputy Director of C3S, said that "temperatures during 2023 likely exceed those of any period in at least the last 100,000 years."

The global average temperature for 2023 was 14.98 degrees Celsius, 0.17 Celsius higher than that of 2016 and nearly 1.5 degrees higher than pre-industrial numbers. In fact, almost half of the days in 2023 were over 1.5 degrees hotter than levels recorded between 1850 and 1900 and during November, two days were over 2 degrees Celsius warmer for the first time in history.

"The Paris Agreement refers to 1.5 degrees above pre-industrial level as an average over 20 years. This is different from what we have recorded in 2023 and what might happen in February 2024," Carlo Buontempo, Director of C3S, explains.

2023 was also Europe's second-warmest year ever, with temperatures exceeding the average during 11 of the 12 months and September was the hottest month ever in the region since recordings started.

Sea surface temperatures (SSTs) also stayed "persistently and unusually high", as per researchers, which is one of the main reasons why global temperatures were higher than normal.

SSTs will continue to remain high or even climb slightly, if the concentration of greenhouse gases will increase, as well.

The concentration level of carbon dioxide was also at its highest point in history and in 2023 it was at 2.4 parts per million (ppm) higher than the previous year, while methane reached 11 parts per billion (ppb).

Mauro Facchini, head of earth observation for the European Commission, said that "the annual data presented here provides yet more evidence of the increasing impacts of climate change."