2016 Is The Hottest Year On Record ! WWF React

2016 has been declared as the hottest year on record by the Met Office, NASA and the U.S National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)

Commenting on this, WWF-UK Chief Executive Tanya Steele said:

“This is yet again a warning sign for governments, businesses and citizens to speed up the shift to a low carbon economy. From our coral reefs being bleached at an alarming rate, to glaciers melting, and the world facing the first mass extinction of wildlife since the dinosaurs, there are more and more danger signs that we are breaching the environmental limits of our planet.

Last year electricity generated by renewable sources, such as wind and solar, overtook coal

“The good news is that world leaders have recognised this and signed up to take decisive action in Paris at the end of 2015. And we have made progress in the UK: last year electricity generated by renewable sources, such as wind and solar, overtook coal. But this is only the start – we need to drastically improve energy efficiency, switch from fossil fuels to renewable energy and change our consumption patterns.”

Commenting on the news, WWF Scotland director Lang Banks said:

“This is one record we would have been happy not to have seen broken, and underlines the urgent need for countries to begin to deliver on the pledges they made at the UN climate talks in Paris.

“Scotland played a positive role in helping to secure the climate deal in Paris. We now need our politicians to continue to play such a role. That is why Ministers must ensure Scotland’s updated climate action plan contains the policies necessary to deliver the carbon reductions science tells us are needed to protect people and nature from the worst impacts of climate change.”