Europe warms faster than any continent, study says Record heat, wildfires, ice loss

Europe has endured a record-breaking year of extreme climate conditions, with abnormal heat affecting more than 95% of the continent, according to a new scientific report cited by The Guardian that warns of accelerating environmental breakdown.

Parts of Scandinavia were hit by 21 consecutive days of intense summer heat, producing “tropical nights” in normally cool countries such as Norway, Sweden and Finland. Campaigners say the findings highlight a rapidly worsening climate crisis.

“The scientists found temperatures in Europe have risen by 0.56C per decade since the mid-1990s – faster than any other continent on the planet – due to the blanket of fossil fuel pollution covering the Earth,” the report stated.

The analysis, drawing on data from the EU’s Copernicus Climate Change Service and the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), found that Europe’s annual sea surface temperatures reached their highest levels on record. Snow cover dropped by 31%, while snow mass declined by 45% compared with long-term averages.

One of the fastest-warming regions on Earth, Svalbard, is now heating at three to four times the European average, the report added.

The extreme heat helped fuel devastating wildfires across Europe in 2025, burning more than one million hectares of land—4.7% above the previous record set in 2017. The Iberian Peninsula was among the hardest hit, following a dry summer preceded by unusually wet conditions that encouraged rapid vegetation growth, later acting as fuel for fires.

In Spain, volunteer firefighters reportedly died while attempting to contain advancing flames using basic farming tools to cut firebreaks around villages. The country accounted for 38% of the total burned area in Europe.

The environmental damage extended beyond land. The report found that glaciers across Europe are melting at accelerating rates, with Iceland recording its second-largest glacier mass loss on record. Meanwhile, the Greenland ice sheet lost 139 gigatons of ice in 2025, contributing nearly half a millimetre to global sea-level rise.

European seas also reached unprecedented temperatures, with ocean warming hitting record levels for the fourth consecutive year. In 2025, 86% of Europe’s ocean experienced “strong” marine heatwaves, while 36% faced “severe” or “extreme” conditions.

The scale of the crisis has prompted stark warnings from environmental groups. “All the emergency warning lights are flashing red,” said John Hyland from Greenpeace, which argues that current EU climate targets are insufficient. “Either governments take swift and effective action to cut carbon pollution right now or they can continue irresponsibly rolling back protections, placing countless people’s health, homes, jobs and livelihoods at risk.”

World leaders pledged in 2015 to limit global warming to 1.5C above pre-industrial levels by the end of the century. However, scientists say that goal is now increasingly out of reach without rapid emissions cuts and large-scale carbon removal.

Global temperatures have already risen by more than 1.3C. Celeste Saulo, secretary general of the WMO, warned that record greenhouse gas concentrations have made it “virtually impossible” to stay below the 1.5C threshold without temporarily exceeding it. “What is important is to keep this overshoot as short and as shallow as possible.”

Earlier this year, EU scientific advisers urged governments to prepare for up to 3C of global warming, describing current action as “insufficient, largely incremental [and] often coming too late.” They called for stronger climate risk planning, expanded resilience measures, and greater investment in adaptation, including urban redesign, improved emergency systems, and community-level preparedness for extreme heat.

By Sabina Mammadli