The year 2024 was the warmest year ever recorded worldwide. The global average temperature was 1.6 degrees higher than before the industrial age. The European climate service Copernicus writes this in its annual report, which was published on Friday.
It is the first time that the global average temperature has risen more than 1.5 degrees higher in a calendar year — a critical limit in the Paris Climate Agreement. The agreement aims to limit global warming to 1.5 or at most 2 degrees. According to climate scientists, it could have much more drastic consequences if the limit of 1.5 degrees is exceeded for a long time.
“The progress is simply incredible,” Carlo Buontempo of the Copernicus climate service told Reuters. He points out that every month in 2024 was the warmest or second warmest month since records began.
Long-term average
Scientists had already announced that 2024 would probably break the heat record again. The record does not mean that the Paris Climate Agreement has been broken. The treaty looks at long-term average temperatures of at least twenty years.
The British Meteorology Office and the Japanese Weather Agency also published their figures. According to Japan, the global average temperature was 1.57 degrees higher than before the industrial age, the British reached 1.53 degrees. American organizations, including NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, will report their figures on Friday.
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Efforts are underway to achieve the climate goals by 2030