Mediterranean warming: climate change adds around two degrees

Climate change has warmed the Mediterranean Sea by around two degrees, according to a World Weather Attribution study published on nineteenth August two thousand and twenty-six. The analysis, reported from Madrid, Spain, examined four coastal regions stretching from the Celtic region to the Mediterranean and found warming above the global average in each.

The Mediterranean’s warming rate is about twice the worldwide average, World Weather Attribution said, after combining observations with climate-model simulations. The organisation attributed most of the recorded rise to climate change.

Marine heatwaves covered ninety per cent of the Bay of Biscay and Iberian coast region and eighty per cent of the western Mediterranean in two thousand and twenty-six. In a climate without human-driven warming, the expected share in both areas would have been about forty per cent.

In the eastern Mediterranean, the affected proportion would drop from seventy per cent to nine per cent without climate change, the study said. In the Celtic region, it would decline from eighty per cent to thirty per cent.

Extreme ocean heat can cause widespread deaths among habitat-forming species including corals, sponges and macroalgae, with effects spreading through marine ecosystems. It can also disrupt food supplies for seabirds and marine mammals.

The researchers warned that further warming could exceed the ability of many marine species to adapt, placing fisheries for cod, haddock, mackerel, scallops and lobster at risk. Marine heatwaves can also increase night-time temperatures and humidity in coastal settlements, while warmer waters can fuel atmospheric moisture linked to destructive storms later in the season.

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Source: Europa Press / Mallorca.com