Abstract

In 2022, western Europe experienced its hottest summer on record and widespread dry conditions, with substantial impacts on health, water and vegetation. Here we use a reanalysis to classify daily mean sea level pressure fields and investigate the influence of synoptic circulations on the occurrence of temperature extremes and dry days. Summer 2022 featured an above-normal occurrence of anticyclones extending from the British Isles to the Baltic countries, as well as enhanced easterly, southerly and low-flow conditions which contributed to the observed extremes over southern and western Europe. While the hot summer of 2022 is only marginally explained by circulation anomalies, such anomalies played a key role in the exceptional occurrence of dry days. The comparison with summer circulation anomalies projected by twenty global climate models moreover suggests that future circulation changes will further exacerbate hot and dry extremes over Europe.