UK average annual temperature tops 10C for first time

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The UK’s annual average temperature topped 10C for the first time in 2022, as last year was confirmed as the country’s warmest on record.

The mean temperature across the 12 months was 10.03C, beating the previous all-time high of 9.88C in 2014, the Met Office said on Thursday.

It means 15 of the UK’s top 20 warmest years on record have all occurred this century – with the entire top 10 within the past two decades.

All four UK nations set new records in 2022, with England seeing the highest average temperature at 10.94C, followed by Wales (10.23C), Northern Ireland (9.85C) and Scotland (8.50C).

Dr Mark McCarthy, head of the Met Office National Climate Information Centre, said: “Although an arbitrary number, the UK surpassing an annual average temperature of 10C is a notable moment in our climatological history.

“This moment comes as no surprise, since 1884 all the 10 years recording the highest annual temperature have occurred from 2003.

“It is clear from the observational record that human-induced global warming is already impacting the UK’s climate.”

Figures also show that 2022 was the warmest on record in the 364-year Central England Temperature (CET) series, which began in 1659 and is the world’s longest-running temperature dataset.

The annual mean CET for 2022 was 11.1C, beating the previous record of 11.0C in 2014.