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© KYODOJapan logs hottest summer on record for 2nd straight year
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73 Comments
Gene Hennigh
Is this mother nature being mother nature? Or is there something else going on. If mother nature, when will she stop?
Corey
Still I love her, even when she takes the form of a typhoon.
John-San
I wonder if there was eel kill cause by the 41c heat in Hamamatsu or are they adapting to the warming conditions. The eel industry is part of the local income in Hamamatsu
Some dude
I wonder how many consecutive "hottest summers on record" it will take to convince the "there's nothing odd about the climate" brigade. 10? 50?
Bad Haircut
Osaka has been hot, but not as hot as some previous years. But let's keep up the alarmism, shall we?
TokyoLiving
But even so, Neanderthals still believe that there is no global warming.
bo
And like Japan is doing anything ? coal and gas burning for electric , no reduction in aircon use ,typical of this backward nation .
Lindsay
Considering these ‘records’ have been kept for less than 150 years it’s not really an indication of anything. It’s just two hot summers.
Alongfortheride
Was it Japans fault for burning coal and electric for air cond units that caused the earth to heat up and melt the ice 10,000 years ago as well?
fallaffel
Look at a trend line of land and sea surface temperatures over the last 100+ years. Here's sea surface, so you can't complain about urban heat island effect: https://www.data.jma.go.jp/gmd/kaiyou/english/long_term_sst_global/glb_warm_e.html#:~:text=The%20annual%20mean%20global%20average,0.61%C2%B0C%20per%20century.&text=The%201991%20%2D%202020%20average%20is%20used%20as%20the%20normal.
virusrex
Unless you can disprove the scientific data that proves the contents of the article there is no alarmism in it, not being able to accept reality, or feeling irrational fear from scientific information is not an argument to try and convince others the current situation is nothing to worry about.
The scientist in the field that know the most about climate do say this is extremely important, obviously nameless people on the internet that say the opposite based exclusively on not understanding the topic are not enough to disprove the experts.
The current crisis has been demonstrated to be direct consequence of human activity, there is no realistic question about it.
zenzen
1] Summer is not over yet. Summer is: June 21 to Sept 21.
2] What is an "instance of extreme heat"?
stormcrow
Do you ever get the feeling that we're all like the frog in the boiling pot of water that doesn't have enough sense to get out until it's too late?
virusrex
The text you quoted clearly describes it as temperatures of 35 C or higher.
Some dude
Do you ever get the feeling that we're all like the frog in the boiling pot of water that doesn't have enough sense to get out until it's too late?
We're actually worse than that. We're the frog in the boiling pot, yelling "ha ha, it's not that hot, oh, hey, my skin's starting to go red and peel off. Ha ha, what a laugh! I'm such a lad, me!"
Jennie
It’s not the temperature but the humidity that’s unbearable.
kurisupisu
It’s all ok! Just turn the aircon down to 22°C.
zenzen
oh!...
thanks.WoodyLee
Looking at that photo sums it all, Black umbrella, All Black cloth are the perfect combination to keep cool. I rest my case.
ian
Lol look again
kohakuebisu
Here's a graph of temperature across the entire country, for the last 90 days. For a weather trend nationwide, this is as consistent as it gets. Its quite common for the two main coasts or the north and south to have different weather patterns. If you click on rainfall on the graph, that is much more inconsistent, with some places getting hammered, esp. around Nagoya-Shizuoka, but others getting below average.
https://www.data.jma.go.jp/obd/stats/data/mdrr/tenkou/indexTenkou.html?gazou=tem90d00&dhi=0
tora
If it was really an issue, Japan would already be "zero carbon" by now. But it continues to spend around 3% of its GDP on the importation of fossil fuels and is the world highest importer of LPG.
Japanese car companies barely even make or sell EVs and Japanese cities take dystopian concrete brutalism to another level. Major Japanese cities have some of the lowest amount of green belts anywhere in the world.
And the shops are full of fast fashion rubbish. I could go on and on.
Flute
@virusrex
I think they understand the part they quoted the question is more about the specific : like place and duration.
For example, if you choose Osaka on JMA website, it seems to record 5 observation points, if you change locality, you see that the record points change along (as to get a better accuracy) : so is it for only 1 point or several.
Also, for how long, it is not the same to go past 35 for 1 minute, than 1 hour, than 4 hours, ...
For that, I can not help, do not remember reading anything about it.
If it is recording tools, there are several tools :
https://www.jma.go.jp/jma/en/Activities/observations.html
The surface one is the AMeDAS
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automated_Meteorological_Data_Acquisition_System
https://www.jma.go.jp/jma/en/Activities/amedas/amedas.html
Eastmann
summers in Japan are...hot.
every year.
sometimes more sometimes less.
no rocket science behind.
4Tno
I disagree. It seems like an ordinary summer, but I would point out that it was a bit delayed by several weeks.
Jason'sWAY
There are many factors to consider when it comes to the increase in temperature, which is actually very minimal. Infrastructure generates heat, contributing to higher ambient temperatures in built-up areas. Weather stations that remain in the same location for decades while a city grows will measure the heat generated by that development. Many people live indoors with air conditioning, which can weaken the body. Still, many work outside and adapt to hot weather. Cold weather kills more than heat, so being a little warmer is not so bad for the human body; however, living in air conditioning can make us weaker. Go to the countryside of any Southeast Asian country, and you'll find many people living without air conditioning—they're not dying from the heat, but rather from a lack of good food and health. There's too much fear nowadays and not enough common sense.
fallaffel
Yes, there's no rocket science behind your claim, or any science at all.
Some dude
Tokyo's tree canopy cover currently stands at 7% and it is falling. In 2013 it was 9%.
It was a long time ago so I'm hazy on the specifics, but I do recall reading that a city council chopped down an entire row of trees along a major road...because one person complained about the trees. One person. Probably a bored PTA housewife or something, but I don't recall.
Never mind that those trees provided shade and had an important environmental impact. Nope, one person complained, so let's chop them all down.
One reason I always cringe when you see people on Facebook going on about how "the Japanese are uniquely attuned to nature and the west could learn a lot from them!"
Nibek32
It wasn’t that hot.
virusrex
I think they understand the part they quoted the question is more about the specific
The original report in Japanese is quite specific:
This means the number reported is the number of locations and days where the temperature surpassed 35 C
Unless you can present validated data to prove your point "disagreeing" with objective measurements only means you are mistaken.
Compared with every year on record? yes, it was.
virusrex
Unless you can disprove them with actual data this is still being in denial and using the universal excuse of antiscientific propaganda groups, A supposed global conspiracy.
The excuse makes no sense, the same as the last time you tried to use it, this is clearly irrational when one of the industries that makes the most profits would give orders of magnitude more funding than any government of the world for any scientist that could demonstrate climate change is not real. Pretending the whole scientific community of the world is in a conspiracy to make money with false results while contradicting one of the most generous sources of money is obviously impossible to believe.
ian
Damn that's a lot
wallace
Fewer butterflies this summer and some varieties I didn't even see. Fewer cicadas but I don't know if that's due to their cycle.
Mike_Oxlong
We're warming slowly, at a cold time in the planet's history, where far more people die of cold than of heat, and where we're safer from both heat and cold because of energy from fossil fuels.
wallace
This old man has struggled more with the heat this summer than the previous ones. Several times mild heatstroke.
burgers and beers
Sure is getting hotter everywhere.
burgers and beers
This old man has struggled more with the heat this summer than the previous ones. Several times mild heatstroke.
Take care wallace.
John-San
Wallace The Japanese cicadas spend 2 to 3 years underground, where they are only nymphs. Once out of the ground, they live only a few weeks, mate, and then die. So go back and check the weather data between two to three years and match the worst condition for cicadas. I assume that would be the reason behind the fewer cicadas this year.
raincloud
@Some dude
Nah, people like that will never be on board, not even after 100. You could shove the smoking gun in their face and they'd just look the other way and reply that they don't believe in science.
wallace
John-San
Yes, I understand the cycle of the cicadas. We have lived in this location for five years and every summer a large number appeared for more than one month. This summer there were some and they stayed for a shorter time.
Cicadas spend 13-17 years underground.
Newgirlintown
Two words: fossil fuels.
Chabbawanga
We had a shedload of butterflies this year, maybe more than usual. Cicadas seemed to have stopped chirping a lot earlier this year, perhaps becasue they started earlier? Not entirely sure.
John-San
Eel farming in Hamamatsu need water temp of 24- 28 so farmer are now looking into adding conditioning of the water to there farming techniques In turn this will affect price. So expect higher eel prices.
JRO
Starting to feel like I need to fix my Aircon that broke 2 years ago.
YongYang
NASA:
https://science.nasa.gov/climate-change/
Science.
Bad Haircut
I take it you live a life without relying on them in any way, true to your values.
ian
That's a US institution but emissions even from US continue to rise.
Seems nobody really believes.
Anyway, science shouldn't be a matter of belief
virusrex
That is an irrational argument. The people that try to manipulate the public into disregarding the warnings from the experts are those that are shielded from the damage by their power and money. Pretending that if the elites don't worry it means you don't have anything to worry as well is like thinking a sedentary life is not unhealthy since billionaires (with practically infinite resources to keep their health and prolong their life) live sedentary lives without worry.
It is not, not believing in science do nothing to disprove the findings, it only make the unbelievers wrong.
Mike_Oxlong
The underwater eruption of Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha'apai volcano on Jan. 15, 2022, sent 146 teragrams of water vapor into the stratosphere, four times more than Mount Pinatubo in 1991. This could affect atmospheric chemistry, ozone depletion, and surface temperature for several years.
ian
Lol you're saying the US govt believes but just chose to continue increasing emissions?
virusrex
I am saying that the people that benefit the most from increasing emissions (and misleading people to ignore the warnings) will not face the worst consequences of doing that, the other 99% of the people will. For them it is much easier and cheaper to buy politicians and put forward campaigns of disinformation than accept the losses that come from reducing the emissions.
ian
You have evidence of that?
If you have no evidence of that that would be really irrational.
virusrex
Of what? that people with money and power can evade consequences? that climate change is real no matter what you want to believe?
So your new argument is that you think the scientists of the world are all wrong? or that billionaires only act according to the common good? because those are not things anybody would believe. It is as irrational as repeatedly breaking the rules of the site instead of addressing the arguments.
Bad Haircut
Which scientists? Your post alludes to the assumption that all scientists agree with your position, and that is patently wrong.
virusrex
There is a consensus of science about climate change, there is even a consensus about how strong the consensus is, as usual you could prove this is wrong by bringing any respected institution of science that disagrees, but you have never been able to bring any example, that demonstrates much more than anything I could say how this consensus is universal.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41562-024-01928-2
https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/ac2966
https://news.cornell.edu/stories/2021/10/more-999-studies-agree-humans-caused-climate-change
https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.1103618
nandakandamanda
War feeds it.
Strangerland
Virusrex just supplied a list of respected scientific institutions that have come to a consensus that climate change is cool.
None of the morons can provide a single link to a single respected medical organization that says climate change is fake, or not man-caused.
And these people think they deserve an equal right to being treated as if they have anything intelligent to say. They want participation certificates.
餓死鬼
Well no, it's climate science.
Some numbers are bigger than ten, some aren't. Some numbers are ten. I can deeply math. (Everyone else suspects I can't count past ten. How dare they.)
John-San
Japan has so far recorded 8,821 instances of "extreme heat" of 35 C or higher, surpassing the previous peak of 6,692 seen last year.
Ok notice they have not given a number of non instances under 35 c this summer. Because the number are I assume would be higher. The reason why non instances under 35c not give is because the numbers would be more and it would make the 8821 not look as good. Why not give both instances and non instances. That would be more scientific to supply both data. No they take their readership are donkeys. and shove only half the data down our throats. And 35c is perfect weather. still below average body temp. Yes of 35c to 40c is not "extreme heat" that is warm weather. over 40c to 45c is hot weather over 45c is consider "extreme heat". They even fudge wording to make 35c look bad. Say something enough gullible people will take it truth.
virusrex
So if a doctor point out that a child have had a fever of 40 C for 3 consecutive days your argument to say he is not sick is to say the child had temperatures below that for other days?
That is irrelevant, when the extreme temperatures are becoming much more frequent this is a clear indication of a trend that have the experts worried about the near future. Saying that (still) more days are not as bad is just an irrational excuse to avoid having to accept this reality.
No, it is not. This betrays a huge deficit in knowledge. 35 degrees is already a temperature that puts people at risk of death by heatstroke. It is extreme weather for Japan and it definitely not just warm, that is just living in denial.
Gene Hennigh
Weather and climate are not the same thing. That's where the denialists come from. Not seeing that weather is a current assessment and that climate is another thing altogether. Back in the days before this climate change, we could see that the climate was different at the equator than the climate at the north pole. Now the climate is beginning to change everywhere. The north pole is now a swimming pool where there used to be ice. The southern US climate was warmer than the north, typically. Now the south is baking and the north is beginning to. To say that it's cooler today than yesterday is a weather report. To say that it's hotter everywhere on earth is viewing the climate of earth. Records for heat are falling everywhere. Antarctica is losing its ice at an incredible rate. It's hotter down there than ever.
The deniers who claim that it's just what mother nature does, never give a clue as to when she will end. Will she end? Will we all fry? Will any of us make it? You don't answer because you don't know. Without action on the part of humans, we will all fry. We can at least say that. When will mother nature stop and go back to normal? Give us a clue. We'd all like for you to be right. But when will you start being right?
The Ripper!
It's been cooler in Japan except for these last two years.
John-San
No, it is not. This betrays a huge deficit in knowledge. 35 degrees is already a temperature that puts people at risk of death by heatstroke. It is extreme weather for Japan and it definitely not just warm, that is just living in denial.
The average temperature of the Japanese onsen is 38 c, well any decent one. One would think the carpark would be full of ambulances
餓死鬼
Are you implying the body temperature just automatically becomes whatever the temperature of the surrounding environment is?
John-San
No, I am I saying 35c is not extreme killer heat. when you have the Japanese culture constantly submitting to 38 c So where are all these deaths from constance exposer to 38c at Onsens.
John-San
Ok Data try this it work. I work outside most of my life in heavy industry and construction. I use common sense when working in the sun up to 38c/100.4 F for 15 minutes on the off, off is usually in the shade. 12 hours 7days week 3 months stints. Millions and million work in these condition everyday. exceeds 38c you go on idle time in a cooler area until it backs of to 38c and under. This is considered safe working practice by western Industrial law. 35c is not unworkable or a killer heat. But the pseudo scientist swears 35c being the max by his own witch doctoring.
virusrex
You mean having strict vigilance of the temperature and times reduces the risk? anything but surprising.
Of course that has absolutely nothing to do with people that are not timed in their exposure nor cold rooms to recover at fixed times, people can definetely die at the temperatures of the articles, and this is not something said by pseudoscientists but by experts, authorities in the field:
https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20230809-the-temperature-the-human-body-cannot-survive
What validated data and standarized methods do you have to contradict the scientific findings that prove even lower temperatures already put the lives of people at risk? obviously a personal appeal of authority from a nameless account is not valid so you would need at least the same quantity and quality of data to disprove the medical authorities. I mean, more than 60K people died of heatstroke in Europe last year, do you think they were all exposed to temperatures way over 38 C to cause this?