OVERHEATED PLANET AROUND THE WORLD

More than 100 million Americans are under heat alerts, according to the government website heat.gov. Texas, Arizona, Nevada and California are expecting potentially hazardous conditions in the coming days, US weather services have warned. Phoenix, the capital of Arizona, recorded its 15th straight day above 43 degrees on Friday, according to the US Weather Services (NWS).

In California's Death Valley, mercury could match or even exceed the highest air temperature ever reliably measured on Earth, 54.4°C recorded at the same location in 2020 and 2021, according to several experts. .

Some regions of China, including the capital Beijing, are also suffering from a strong heat wave. One of the country's main electricity companies said on Monday it recorded a record daily electricity generation, due to increased demand linked to high temperatures.

Parts of eastern Japan are also expected to reach 38-39C on Sunday and Monday, according to the local forecaster.

At the same time, Italy, Spain, France, Germany, Greece and Poland are also facing a large heat wave. In Germany, over a large part of the country, temperatures could thus rise to 38 degrees, according to a press release from the German meteorological service. In Spain, the ground temperature has risen to 60°C in Extremadura, a region in the south-west of the country, according to the European observatory Copernicus. In Italy, a heat wave is expected to hit the south of the country this Saturday, resulting in temperatures slightly above 38 ° C in Sardinia, Sicily, Calabria and Puglia, with peaks “at 40 ° C and beyond, particularly Sunday” as in Rome (43°C expected on Sunday) or in Sardinia (48°C);

In Greece, the authorities have decided to close the Acropolis of Athens, the ancient emblematic monument and the most visited in the country, at the hottest hours, from 12 p.m. to 5 p.m.

North Africa is also affected. In Morocco, which has been experiencing a series of heat waves since the beginning of the summer, a red heat alert has been issued for several provinces.

Heat is one of the deadliest weather events, the WMO said. Last summer in Europe alone, high temperatures caused more than 60,000 deaths, according to a recent study. The cyclical El Niño weather phenomenon, which usually causes global temperatures to rise, is also contributing to the worsening situation.

Compared to the pre-industrial era, the world is experiencing a warming close to 1.2°C as a result of human activity.