According to data released by the Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S), summer 2021 was the hottest in Europe for 20 years with an increase of 1ºC above the average.

“The average June-August temperature for Europe in 2021 was close to 1°C above the 1991-2020 average, making it the hottest summer,” reads the document released by the Climate Change Monitoring Service Copernicus (C3S) programme.

This was the hottest summer only by “a small margin”, according to analysis of data showing that, over the past two decades, the hottest summers of 2010 and 2018 were about 0.1°C cooler than the previous year.

August's surface air temperature was also among the highest in 20 years, along with August 2017: It was “0.3°C warmer than the 1991-2020 average”.

Despite the summer being close to the 1991-2020 average, the C3S recalls that the different regions of Europe had very contrasting conditions, with "record maximum temperatures in Mediterranean countries", "higher than average temperatures in the east", but also “below average temperatures in the north”.

The European Union's C3S publishes monthly climate bulletins in which it reports on observed changes in global surface air temperature, sea ice cover and hydrological variables.

“All the findings reported are based on computer-generated analyses using billions of measurements from satellites, ships, aircraft and weather stations around the world,” explains the Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S).