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Scientists are issuing a stark warning about climate change after the planet hit a key warming benchmark in 2024.
Newly released data from the European Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Service showed last week that the world’s average surface temperature it was over 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) warmer on average last year than before industrialization.
Data from the United States showed the world was far from the 1.5 degree threshold.
Scientists have said that to avoid some of the worst and most irreversible impacts of climate change, policymakers should try to limit warming to this benchmark. The 1.5 degree benchmark was enshrined in the Paris Agreement, in which most global nations pledged to work to keep the world from crossing it in an effort to protect against these effects.
Just because the Earth hits the 1.5 degree threshold for just one year doesn’t necessarily mean it’s warmed that much permanently. However, the data are a stark reminder that the planet is nearing irreversible damage.
“In a way, it’s certainly a very important and very sad milestone for the world, and it’s just a real wake-up call that the climate crisis is here,” said Laurie Geller, an atmospheric scientist who heads the office scientific peer review. to the Natural Resources Defense Council, an environmental advocacy group.
However, he added, “in other ways, though, I think it’s less of a line than some people think it is.”
When scientists and the global Paris Agreement talk about limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees, they usually mean more than a year.
“Monthly and annual breaches of 1.5°C do not mean the world has failed to meet the temperature target of the Paris Agreement, which refers to a long-term increase in temperature over decades, not months or individual years,” the United Nations said. indicates the website.
However, Alex Ruane, co-director of the climate impact group at NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies, noted that overall, years have gotten warmer, not colder.
“We continue to have 10-year periods that are much warmer than previous 10-year periods. So we really don’t see much room for temperature to come back down unless policies change,” said Ruane, who is also a research scientist at from Columbia University and worked on the latest United Nations climate report.
“In this respect, crossing this threshold suggests that we will be living in a 1.5 degree warmer environment for some time,” he added.
The planet’s 10 warmest years since record-keeping began in 1850 have occurred in the past decade, according to US data.
Last year’s grim milestone comes as wildfires raging in California highlight the dangers of warming. Climate change has made the western US more susceptible to forest fires because when the temperature is warmer, the air demands more moisture and makes the vegetation drier. This dry vegetation can be fuel that aggravates a fire.
One reason scientists are urging the global community to try to limit warming is to avoid crossing “tipping points” — extreme environmental damage caused by climate change that is difficult to reverse.
This includes the possibility of the Greenland ice sheet melting, the Amazon rainforest shrinking significantly, and the collapse of the currents of the Atlantic Ocean which help regulate global temperature.
Missing 1.5 degrees more sustainably would bring the world closer to some of these points. A study has lovedfor example, that the Greenland ice sheet could see an abrupt melt once warming has reached 1.7 to 2.3 degrees Celsius (3.1 to 4.1 degrees Fahrenheit).
“Some of these global tipping points are large and active areas of research, but they’re not magically or directly connected to this 1.5,” Ruane said.
“The more the world warms, the closer we get to these kinds of tipping points,” he added.
But, scientists say, every additional warming increment is also important.
“This is just kind of another step down the road where, you know, 1.5 is worse than 1.49, but so is 1.51 worse than 1.5,” Ruane said.
Gisela Winckler, a climate professor at Columbia University, added that every rise in temperature means additional damage to people and the planet.
“It means a whole list of impacts that we’re seeing,” Winckler said, adding that this includes “increasing extreme weather events, whether it’s drought on the one hand, but also extreme precipitation events … increasing water vapor in the atmosphere as a result of global warming.”
