The four hottest years on record were 2015, 2016, 2017 and 2018, according to government institutions including NOAA and NASA.

Human activity is the primary cause of rising global temperatures in recent decades, and there is no convincing evidence to the contrary, according to a report issued Friday by 13 U.S. agencies. The assessment, approved by the White House, contradicts public statements by President Donald Trump and several top members of his administration.

The findings came in the Fourth National Climate Assessment, an authoritative review of climate science. The assessment finds that the period from 1901-2016 was the warmest in modern civilization and warns that temperatures and sea levels will rise much more if no action is taken.

"This assessment concludes, based on extensive evidence, that it is extremely likely that human activities, especially emissions of greenhouse gases, are the dominant cause of the observed warming since the mid-20th century," the report finds.

"For the warming over the last century, there is no convincing alternative explanation supported by the extent of the observational evidence."

Trump has called climate change a "hoax." Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt and Energy Secretary Rick Perry both told CNBC earlier this year that carbon dioxide emissions from human activity are not the primary driver of climate change.

@realDonaldTrump: The concept of global warming was created by and for the Chinese in order to make U.S. manufacturing non-competitive.

The Trump administration has rolled back a series of Obama-era rules and initiatives to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and mitigate the effects of climate change. Trump announced in June that he will pull the United States out of the Paris Agreement, a global effort to prevent world temperatures from rising 2 degrees Celsius above preindustrial levels.