World to swelter as fossil fuels double the number of 50 degree days

No matter where your country stands along the equator, fossil fuels could soon see your nation enduring extreme heat.

A new report has found that the number of hot days where the temperature reaches 50 degrees celsius or above has doubled since the 1980s.

The analysis also found that extreme heat is also occurring in more locations than ever before.

Between 1980 and 2009, temperatures exceeded 50 degrees around 14 days a year, with this number rising to 26 days a year between 2010 and 2019.

Meanwhile, temperatures of 45 and above occurred on average an extra two weeks annually.

Fossil fuels driving up temperatures

It comes as the Environmental Change Institute at the University of Oxford says “the increase can be 100 percent attributed to the burning of fossil fuels”.

Whilst temperatures of 50 and above usually happen in the Middle East and Gulf regions, this year Italy and Canada also sweltered through a record-breaking summer.

Dr Sihan Li, a climate researcher at the School of Geography and the Environment at the University of Oxford, warns these won’t be the only country’s affected, with the nonrenewable fuel sources driving temperatures up around the world.

“With continued emissions and lack of action, not only will these extreme heat events become more severe and more frequent, but emergency response and recovery will become more challenging.”

Dr Sihan Li

Extreme bursts of heat can have deadly repercussions for both humans and nature, with buildings, roads and electricity all likely to buckle under the pressure.

In central Iraq, farmers have seen their once fertile land turn into desert, with the soil now cracked, dry and barren.

And it won’t be the only country enduring such extreme consequences, with more to follow suit if governments don’t take on scientists’ warnings.