MADRID (AP) — Spain said Tuesday that summer 2025 was the hottest on record for the southern European nation, which like the entire Mediterranean region is being hard hit by climate change.
Its national weather service said that the country had an average temperature of 24.2 C (75.5 F) between June 1 and Aug. 31. That is the highest temperature since the service started keeping records in 1961. The previous record was set in 2022 at 24.1 C.
This summer was also 2.1 degrees Celsius (3.7 F) hotter than the national average from 1991-2020.
The highest single-day temperature of 45.8 C (119.3 F) was recorded in Jerez de la Frontera, in southern Spain, on Aug. 17 during a heat wave.
The Mediterranean region is heating up 20% faster than the global average, according to the United Nations.
The scorching summer months also saw Spain’s countryside burn.
A record 382,000 hectares (944,000 acres) burned in a spate of wildfires, surpassing the previous high of 306,000 hectares (756,000 acres) burned in 2022, according to data compiled by the European Union’s European Forest Fire Information System.
Spain’s weather service added that the country also had a particularly dry summer, especially in the areas of the northwest where wildfires did most of their damage.
Europe has been warming twice as fast as the global average since the 1980s, according to the European Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Service.
Scientists warn that climate change is exacerbating the frequency and intensity of heat and dryness, especially in parts of southern Europe, making the region more vulnerable to health impacts and wildfires.
The main driver of climate change is the burning of fossil fuels like gasoline, oil and coal.
Banner image: A woman fans herself in Madrid, Spain, July 10, 2023. (AP Photo/Manu Fernandez, File)
This story first appeared on Mongabay
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