My Climate Change News

As climate change warms the world, summers are lengthening, temperatures are climbing and the season’s markers — blooming wildflowers, migrating butterflies and songbirds — are undergoing a visible shift.

Whether they’re aware of it or not, most people in the United States just experienced a summer with all the fingerprints of global warming. Above-average heat withered crops, put millions of people under advisories to stay indoors and led state authorities to ask residents to conserve power. A series of extraordinary floods damaged cities and towns, exposing the fragility of aging sewer and drinking water systems.

This summer was the second-warmest in the past 50 years, trailing only 2021, a Washington Post analysis of data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration found. On average, Americans experienced a summer 1.8 degrees Fahrenheit warmer than the average over the past 50 years.