This week’s Western heat wave would have been “virtually impossible” without the influence of climate change, according to a new study.
That puts the event in the same category as the record-shattering Pacific Northwest heat dome of 2021, which is widely regarded as one of the most extreme weather events ever to strike the U.S. This week’s unprecedented heat has brought summer-like weather to a wide swath of the West, with temperatures hovering near or soaring past 100 degrees Fahrenheit in California, Arizona and Nevada.
The new study, released Friday by the climate science consortium World Weather Attribution, found that heat waves in the western U.S. have grown about 4 degrees Celsius, or 7.2 F, hotter since the industrial era began.
But this week’s event was extreme even for the modern climate, with the research team concluding that this week’s temperatures would not have been possible at all on a planet without global warming. Such an event would be expected, under the current climate conditions, to occur only once about every 500 years, according to the study.
