GENEVA (AFP)
- Global temperatures continued to rise this year putting 2000
on record as one of the warmest years since 1860 and prompting
a number of extreme weather events, meteorological experts said
here on Tuesday.
Despite the
"cooling influence" of the La Nina Pacific weather phenonenon,
the mean global temperature is now 0.6 degrees centigrade above
that recorded at the start of the twentieth century, the World
Meteorological Organisation (WMO) said.
Presenting
its preliminary findings for the year, the WMO said the global
average surface temperature for 2000 was likely to be about 0.32
degrees centrigrade above the average for the period 1961 to 1990.
1999, the
fifth warmest year in the last 140 years, was also above this
average.
"The
climate of 2000 represents a continuation of the global warming
conditions that have persisted throughout the 90s," WMO Secretary-General
Godwin Obasi told a news conference.
This year
will probably be "either the fifth or sixth warmest year
since the last 140 years," Obasi said, adding "at the
same time the greenhouse gases continue to increase".
Among the
"very unusual weather events" in 2000 was the first
thunderstorm on record to have moved through Barrow in Alaska
in the United States in June.
"Thunderstorms
are more typical of warmer climates," the WMO said.
In Bulgaria,
100-year records for the maximum daily temperature were broken
at more than 75 percent of all observation stations in July, while
Canada saw its first deadly tornado in more than 14 years, the
WMO highlighted.
Asked if the
extreme conditions could be seen as greater evidence that global
warming is taking place, Obasi said "it is consistent with
a warmer planet".
The Atlantic
Ocean also experienced in 2000 an above average number of hurricanes
and tropical storms -- 15 compared to the average 10 -- while
the Pacific had 22 storms, which is below the average of about
28, WMO said.
Mike Harrison,
WMO chief of climate information and protection services, said
on present evidence he believed the "earliest we may get
an El Nino is towards the end of next year".
But he told
reporters: "I think we can be fairly certain there is no
immediate concern over the development of an El Nino but when
the next one will come we cannot be precise at the present time."
El Nino, a
massive displacement of water in the Pacific Ocean, brings higher
surface temperatures off the coast of South America and cooler
waters around Australia and New Zealand.
The phenomenon
is believed to cause droughts, floods, frosts and forest fires
around the world.
A UN conference
in the The Hague to complete the Kyoto Protocol which seeks to
limit emissions of greenhouse gases failed last month over differences
between the United States and the EU.
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