New Delhi, 26 September 2026: The impact of climate change is no longer limited to just increasing global temperatures, but it is also causing major changes in the calendar of the summer season. An analysis of 45 years of global climate data has revealed that the duration of extreme heat in almost half of the world is longer than ever before. This change is being seen mainly in North-West India even before the onset of normal summer, due to which people do not get time to adapt to the environment and health related risks are increasing.
Researchers investigated whether the increase in average temperature is responsible for the change in this period of intense heat? The analysis revealed that some of the changes occurring in the middle of the summer season can be understood through this, but the changes occurring at the beginning and end of the season cannot be fully explained by the increasing average temperature alone. The changes in temperature in 80 percent of the world's land area do not match this simple calculation. According to researchers, changes in regional rainfall patterns, changes in land use and large-scale system changes are also affecting the summer calendar.
Researchers from institutions including America's NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies and New York University compared data from 1980-1989 and 2015-2024. According to research, the duration of dry heat has increased in about 50 percent of the world's land and the duration of humid intense heat has increased in 48 percent of the area. This study has been published in the famous journal 'AGU Advances'. The pattern of increasing heat in different areas of the world is not uniform. In some areas, intense heat extends from late summer into autumn, while in Western Europe, South Africa and north-west India the heat extends mainly towards (ie earlier than) spring.