2016: Earth's Third Year in a Row of Record-High Temperatures

After performing independent analyses, NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) have announced that 2016 was the hottest year on record, continuing a decades-long warming trend. This is the first time in modern history that measured temperatures have broken the previous records for three years in a row. Scientists at NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) analyzed measurements from 6,300 locations and found that Earth's average surface temperature has risen about 2.0 degrees Fahrenheit since the late-19th century, largely a result of human emissions into the atmosphere.

Transcript

00:00:00 Earth just experienced the warmest year on record, again. 2016 was the third year in a row with record-high surface temperature, part of a decades-long warming trend. NASA scientists track global temperature changes to better understand Earth’s changing climate.

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