Global warming is responsible for three out of four hot temperature extremes around the world, and almost one-fifth of heavy precipitation events over land.

Erich Fischer and Reto Knutti at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich used climate simulations to compare the frequencies of daily hot and wet extremes over the past century with those projected for the twenty-first century under a high-emissions scenario.

They found that with 2 °C of warming above pre-industrial levels, extreme events that were once expected to occur every 30 years or so might happen every 10–20 years.

Nature Clim. Change http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nclimate2617 (2015)