Highest recorded temperatures supercharged extreme weather !! ::: '....worse to come', EU data shows

Temperatures were boosted in the first half of 2024 by the natural El Niño climate phenomenon, but remained very high in the second half of the year even when El Niño dissipated.

Highest recorded temperatures supercharged extreme weather – with worse to come, EU data shows 

Hottest year on record sent planet past 1.5C of heating for first time in 2024  

Carbon emissions in 2024 are expected to have set a new record high, meaning there is no sign yet of the transition away from fossil fuels pledged by the world’s nations at the UN climate conference in Dubai in December 2023. The world is on track for a catastrophic 2.7C of global heating by the end of the century.

The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) confirmed that 2024 was officially the warmest year on record, surpassing 2023, which had previously held the record. Global temperature data going back to 1850 shows an alarming trend of escalating heat.

Climate breakdown drove the annual global temperature above the internationally agreed 1.5 C target for the first time last year, supercharging extreme weather and causing “misery to millions of people”.

The average temperature in 2024 was 1.6C above preindustrial levels, data from the EU’s Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) shows. That is a jump of 0.1C from 2023, which was also a record hot year and represents levels of heat never experienced by modern humans.

The heating is primarily caused by the burning of fossil fuels, and the damage to lives and livelihoods will continue to escalate around the world until coal, oil and gas are replaced. 

The Paris agreement target of 1.5C is measured over a decade or two, so a single year above that level does not mean the target has been missed, but does show the climate emergency continues to intensify. 

Every year in the past decade has been one of the 10 hottest, in records that go back to 1850.

The average person was exposed last year to an additional six weeks of dangerously hot days, intensifying the fatal impact of heatwaves around the world.

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“The world doesn’t need to come up with a magical solution to stop things from getting worse in 2025,” Otto said. 

“We know exactly what we need to do to transition away from fossil fuels, halt deforestation and make societies more resilient.”