Fueled by the climate crisis, the global average temperature soared above the 1.5 degrees Celsius threshold for the first time in 2024, intensifying extreme weather.
Experts from the United Nations World Meteorological Organization (WMO) have confirmed that last year was the planet’s hottest on record, reaching 1.55 degrees Celsius above the pre-industrial average, reported UN News.
“We saw extraordinary land, sea surface temperatures, extraordinary ocean heat accompanied by very extreme weather affecting many countries around the world, destroying lives, livelihoods, hopes and dreams,” said Clare Nullis, WMO spokesperson, as UN News reported. “We saw many climate change impacts retreating sea ice glaciers. It was an extraordinary year.”
Four out of six of the international datasets analyzed by WMO showed a global average temperature for 2024 that was higher than 1.5 degrees Celsius, while two did not.
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The 1.5 degrees Celsius average is the goal temperature threshold of the 2015 Paris Agreement, with an overall target of temperatures worldwide remaining “well below” two degrees Celsius above the pre-industrial average.
WMO maintained that the Paris Agreement was “not yet dead but in grave danger,” explaining that the long-term temperature goals of the accord were measured across decades, not individual years.
WMO Secretary-General Celeste Saulo emphasized that “climate history is playing out before our eyes. We’ve had not just one or two record-breaking years, but a full ten-year series.”
“It is essential to recognize that every fraction of a degree of warming matters. Whether it is at a level below or above 1.5C of warming, every additional increment of global warming increases the impacts on our lives, economies and our planet,” Saulo said.
WMO weather experts said the catastrophic and deadly Los Angeles wildfires were made worse by climate change, with rains boosting vegetation growth, followed by more days of warm, dry and windy weather.
Data from the European Union’s Copernicus CIimate Change Service (C3S) showed that the amount of our planet affected by a minimum of “strong heat stress” reached a new annual maximum on July 10, 2024, when a record approximately 44 percent of Earth was impacted by “strong” to “extreme heat stress.” That’s five percent more than the average yearly maximum.
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“There’s now an extremely high likelihood that we will overshoot the long-term average of 1.5C in the Paris agreement limit,” said Dr. Samantha Burgess, deputy director of C3S, as reported by The Guardian. “These high global temperatures, coupled with record global atmospheric water vapour levels in 2024, meant unprecedented heatwaves and heavy rainfall events, causing misery for millions of people.”
Last year, the average human was exposed to an extra six weeks of dangerous heat, which intensified heat waves across the globe.
UN Secretary-General António Guterres said the findings by WMO are more proof of global heating, and urged governments to deliver updated national climate action plans in 2025 to limit the long-term temperature rise to 1.5 degrees Celsius, UN News reported.
“Individual years pushing past the 1.5℃ limit do not mean the long-term goal is shot,” Guterres said. “It means we need to fight even harder to get on track. Blazing temperatures in 2024 require trail-blazing climate action in 2025.”
“There’s still time to avoid the worst of climate catastrophe. But leaders must act – now,” Guterres added.
Datasets used by WMO in their analysis were taken from NASA, the United States National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the European Center for Medium Range Weather Forecasts, the UK Met Office working in collaboration with University of East Anglia’s Climatic Research Unit, the Japan Meteorological Agency and Berkeley Earth.
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WMO also highlighted a separate study on ocean warming, saying it had played a major role in the record high temperatures in 2024.
“The ocean is the warmest it has ever been as recorded by humans, not only at the surface but also for the upper 2,000 metres,” WMO said, citing the findings, which spanned seven countries and were published in the journal Advances in Atmospheric Sciences.
WMO noted that the ocean stores roughly 90 percent of excess heat produced by global warming, “making ocean heat content a critical indicator of climate change.”
WMO explained that the upper part of the ocean became warmer by about 140 times the planet’s total electricity output from 2023 to 2024.
“This record needs to be a reality check. A year of extreme weather showed just how dangerous life is at 1.5C. The Valencia floods, U.S. hurricanes, the Philippines typhoons and Amazon drought are just four disasters last year that were worsened by climate change. There are many, many more,” said Dr. Friederike Otto, a climate science senior lecturer at Imperial College London’s Grantham Institute for Climate Change, as reported by The Guardian. “The world doesn’t need to come up with a magical solution to stop things from getting worse in 2025. We know exactly what we need to do to transition away from fossil fuels, halt deforestation and make societies more resilient.”
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