Preliminary data from the first nine months of the year indicates that 2016 will likely be the warmest year on record, according to the World Meteorological Organization (WMO).

The group's scientists are 90 percent certain that 2016's temperatures will remain high enough to pass the mark set by 2015.  El Nino had an impact, but the most significant factor driving temperatures up continues to be CO2 emissions - man-made global warming.

This year's temperatures up to September were 0.88 C degrees above the average for the period between 1961-90.  Last year's record was set by the earth being warmed just 0.77 C degrees over that average.  Overall, temperatures from January to September were 1.2 C degrees above pre-industrial levels, which is well more than half-way to the 2 degree limit specified in the Paris Climate accord. 

These record setting temperatures are likely the new normal.  Human activities have already ensured that the global annual average temperature of 2015 will be the norm "no later than 2040", according to a study published last week in the Bulletin of American Meteorological Society.  More research shows that if carbon emissions continue to rise at their current rate, these record hot years will be the "new normal" by 2025.

Australian climatologist Sophie C. Lewis, PhD, explains, "That means the record hot summer of 2013 in Australia - when we saw temperatures approaching 50 C degree in parts of Australia, bushfires striking the Blue Mountains in October, major impacts to our health and infrastructure and a summer that was so hot it became known as the 'angry summer' - could be just another average summer season by 2035."