Records are made to be broken, but 2016 will get to keep its crown of hottest year on record – at least for one more year. NASA scientists at the Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) are finished analyzing 2017 weather data and have concluded it is the second-hottest year globally on record, with global temperatures averaging 1.62 °F above the 1951 to 1980 mean.
A separate and independent analysis by NOAA scientists slightly disputed that finding, however, due to minor differences in methodology interpolating data after shifts in weather station locations and measurement practices have occurred. Even so, both agencies agree that each of the five warmest years on record have occurred between 2010 and 2017.
GISS director Gavin Schmidt says current global temperature trends stretch back before 2010, however.