People Exposed to Climate Change: June-August 2024

Read the full report: People Exposed to Climate Change: June-August 2024
Download the data: 22 major regions; 218 countries, territories, or dependencies; 254 states, territories, or provinces of the largest countries; and 940 cities around the world

Key Facts

June through August 2024 was Earth’s hottest season on record. During this period, the effects of human-induced climate change, mainly from burning fossil fuels, were evident in all regions of the world in the form of extreme heat, as well as heavy rainfall, deadly floods and storms, and raging wildfires. This analysis uses Climate Central’s Climate Shift Index (CSI) to determine the influence of climate change on temperatures around the globe between June-August 2024. 

This report finds that human-caused climate change increased heat-related health risks for billions, and made heat extreme events longer and more likely around the globe. Key findings include:

• One in four people on the planet had no break from climate change-driven heat. On every day in June, July, and August, they experienced unusually warm temperatures made at least three times more likely by climate change. 

• Global exposure peaked on August 13, 2024, when 4.1 billion people — half (50%) of all people worldwide — experienced unusual temperatures made at least three times more likely by climate change.  

• The average person on the planet experienced 17 extra days of risky heat because of climate change. Risky heat days are days with temperatures hotter than 90% of the temperatures recorded in a local area from 1991-2020. Heat-related health risks rise when temperatures climb above this local threshold.

• Over 2 billion people (25% of the global population) experienced 30 or more days of risky heat that were made at least three times more likely by climate change. This included nearly the entire population of the Caribbean and at least three in every four people in: Western Asia, Micronesia, Northern Africa, and Southern Europe. 

• 72 countries, home to more than 2.3 billion people, experienced their hottest June-August period since at least 1970. The average person in these countries experienced a very strong influence of climate change on 34 of the 92 total days from June-August.

• 180 cities in the Northern Hemisphere (experiencing summer in June-August) had at least one dangerous extreme heat wave (at least five consecutive days with temperatures hotter than 99% of temperatures recorded in that city from 1991-2020). Across these 180 cities, extreme heat waves of this intensity and duration are, on average, 21 times more likely today because of human-caused climate change. 

Data

• Download data for June 1, 2024 to August 31, 2024: Climate Shift Index (CSI) levels for 22 major regions; 218 countries, territories, or dependencies; 254 states, territories, or provinces of the largest countries; and 940 cities around the world.

Major funding provided by the Bezos Earth Fund and The Schmidt Family Foundation.