Currently — June 12, 2023: Ocean temperatures are soaring

The weather, currently.

Global ocean temperatures are soaring and climate scientists aren’t really sure why.

For more than three months, the oceans have been warmer than ever before in the history of human recordkeeping. Right now, North Atlantic temperatures are about 35% higher than the previous record — a shockingly large amount that is further above the previous record than any other recordbreaking year in history.

These kinds of superlatives may be difficult to read and process. That’s not just true of casual observers, it’s true of the scientists who have devoted their lives to studying the Earth’s climate system. The Earth is officially in an El Niño now — a periodic warming of the Pacific Ocean that happens every 3-5 years — but that doesn’t necessarily explain why the Atlantic is so warm right now.

One still-controversial theory for this sudden warming has been put forth by the legendary James Hansen, the former NASA chief whose testimony to Congress back in 1988 first put global warming on the map. In 2020, new shipping regulations sharply limited sulfur pollution from ocean ships in the North Atlantic, and sulfate aerosol emissions — which have a planetary cooling effect — have fallen sharply since. If you run the numbers, as Hansen has, such a sharp reduction might partially explain the surge in Atlantic Ocean temps.

-Eric Holthaus

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—Eric Holthaus