China, Europe, US drought: Is 2022 the driest year recorded?

One measure of drought conditions used by scientists is based on the level of moisture in the soil as measured by satellite imagery. We can see that most of Europe has experienced much drier weather this summer than the average for the period 2001 to 2016. Elsewhere, the west of China has been very dry, with many areas experiencing extreme drought. Scientists say climate change means Europe will continue to experience more frequent and persistent droughts, and the dry conditions this year have affected agriculture, transport and energy generation. "We have now had consecutive droughts for the last five years, and this year is the worst Europe-wide drought in hundreds of years," says Dr Fred Hattermann, of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research. Drought conditions in eastern Ethiopia, northern Kenya and Somalia have led the UN to warn that some 22 million people could be at risk of starvation. A World Bank report in 2021 noted that overall "Relative to 1970-79, the numbers of droughts and floods were nearly threefold and tenfold respectively, by 2010-19". Drought conditions in the western US have become the norm, with the region experiencing years of drier and hotter weather. In a report published in February, scientists said the last two decades had seen the most extreme drought conditions in 1,200 years in the American west.