Cuba breaks records for maximum temperatures
HAVANA, July 13. Cuba added this Wednesday new local maximum temperature records for July by registering 37.4 and 33.6 degrees Celsius, respectively, in the towns of Caujerí and Pinares de Mayarí (both in the eastern part of the country), reported the Institute of Meteorology (Insmet).
The day before, the thermometers set three other records: 36.7 degrees were registered in Aguada de Pasajeros, (center), 36.2 degrees in Guira (west) and 33.1 degrees in Pinares de Mayarí.
The Insmet also noted that at 11:00 this morning, more than 80% of the island’s weather stations were reporting temperatures above 31 degrees.
According to studies by the Ministry of Science, Technology and the Environment (Citma), the projections for the Caribbean country in the face of the effects of global warming, foresee that the increase in the average annual temperature will be above one degree Celsius in 2030 and will be of 3.5 degrees in 2070, taking the period 1961-1990 as a reference.
These estimates exceed the 1.5 established by the international community to combat climate change, an increase set in the Paris Agreement as a limit to avoid the most catastrophic consequences of global climate variation on the planet.
Similarly, rainfall would suffer a reduction of close to 10%, considering the historical average. The year 2022 was already classified as the third hottest recorded in Cuba in seven decades, with 0.88 degrees Celsius above the average, according to a report prepared by scientists from Insmet and the Institute of Marine Sciences, cited last Monday by official media.
According to this study of the Cuban climate, the years 2019-2022 “are the warmest since 1951” and 2022 “contributed to accentuate the tendency to increase the average temperature in Cuba.”
Likewise, he pointed out that the average annual relative level of the sea reached “the highest value in its entire history” when it rose to 30.85 centimeters.
Specifically, the report warns that this “sustained and widespread increase” in temperatures, as well as the rise in sea level is “giving rise to increasing pressures on coastal ecosystems” and causing “significant damage and losses to the economy ” from Cuba.
