2023 marked a year of unprecedented climate records being shattered as extreme weather events, including heat waves, floods, droughts and wildfires, left behind a trail of widespread devastation and despair. Scientists say that these disasters have been made worse by climate change.

To assess the global efforts to combat climate change, delegates around the world have gathered in Dubai, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), for the ongoing 2023 United Nations Climate Change Conference, or COP28, which began on Thursday.

The United Kingdom was hit by severe heat waves in the summer of 2022, which led to the deaths of over 3,000 people, according to its official data.

Earlier this year, CGTN talked to Bob Ward, policy and communications director at Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment, who shared the lessons the UK has learned from the 2022 extreme heat. 

(Cover image designed by CGTN's Liu Shaozhen)