Climate Change in Saxony

It’s getting noticeably warmer — globally and in Saxony. 2018 was the hottest year in Saxony’s entire measurement history (10.3 °C annual average). I wanted to capture this in a few compact charts, both for Saxony as a whole and for Leipzig in particular.

Saxony — regional data since 1881

The left chart shows annual mean temperature over time; the right plots each year’s temperature against its total precipitation. Blue dots are pre-2000, black dots post-2000, red is 2018.

A clearly rising mean temperature over the decades. The warmest years (2018, 2014, 2000, 2015, 1934) are — with one exception — all in the recent past. In the scatter plot, the post-2000 cluster sits visibly higher than the historical data. A link between precipitation and temperature is not apparent.

Leipzig — daily data since 1973

The same pair of charts, now from daily station data for Leipzig/Halle.

The same pattern, more precisely resolved. In Leipzig, the 2018 annual average reached 11.3 °C — a new record for the station.

Sunshine hours — Saxony since 1951

Sunshine hours are not directly driven by anthropogenic climate change but mainly by cloud cover — still, an interesting trend emerges:

A slight upward trend, especially since the 2000s. Whether this is related to shifting large-scale weather patterns or to the decline in air pollution after German reunification cannot be answered from the data alone.

All data from DWD open data, retrieved spring 2019. Regional values are monthly area averages for Saxony since 1881 (sunshine since 1951). Station data is daily values from Leipzig/Halle (ID 02932) since 1973. Annual figures are arithmetic means (temperature) or sums (precipitation).