Average temperatures reached 16.19ºC, surpassing the previous record set in 1995 by 0.08ºC. The milestone follows the hottest spring ever recorded and places 2024 on track to overtake last year as Ireland’s hottest year overall.

Met Éireann climatologist Paul Moore said the trend is unmistakable. “The added heat in the system now and the continuous background warming are pushing up mean and minimum temperatures,” he explained. “That can transform an otherwise unremarkable season into a record-breaking one.”

Moore stressed that human-induced climate change is the driving force. Ireland has already warmed up by over 1.1ºC, with the raised baseline now clearly reflected in the data. Nighttime temperatures, he noted, are climbing faster than daytime ones, influenced in part by marine heatwaves.

Looking ahead, Moore said every season is set to get warmer, with spring and summer likely to become drier overall. However, the increased moisture in the warmer atmosphere also means heavier downpours and heatwaves in summer,” he warned, “but also more extreme rainfall events.”

For farmers, the picture is increasingly unpredictable. While the growing season has lengthened, extreme weather at either end has disrupted agricultural planning. “Some years the ground is too wet to work in spring, as we saw a couple of years ago, while in other years it’s been too dry for growth to start properly,” Moore said.

The record summer, alongside the exceptional spring, highlights how rising global temperatures are now a lived reality in Ireland, reshaping weather patterns and complicating the outlook for agriculture, water, and daily life.