2024 has been confirmed as the hottest year ever recorded since data began to be collected, according to a report by the European Union's Copernicus Climate Change Service. The average global temperature last year was 15.1 °C and was the first time it was 1.5 °C warmer than pre-industrial temperatures (1850-1900)
This week, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) published a report saying that there is an 80% probability that last year's temperature will be surpassed within five years. There is also a higher probability of 86% that it will exceed the 1.5 °C average temperature between 1850-1900. More worryingly, they also predict that the temperature increase in the Arctic region will be higher than the global average.
Last year, the highest average temperature recorded every month reveals the increasingly serious situation of climate change. Among the strange phenomena last year was that the peak of Mount Fuji was not snowed in throughout October as usual.
Climate change is already destroying habitats and threatening the extinction of Earth’s flora and fauna. Data from Copernicus suggests that the 2015 Paris Climate Agreement target of limiting temperature increases to 1.5ºC may have already been missed. The pandemic six years ago slowed global warming but it was only temporary.
This year’s WMO report was produced with the help of 220 experts and climate models contributed by the Global Production Centres: the Barcelona Supercomputer Centre, the Canadian Centre for Climate Modelling and Analysis, the Deutscher Wetter Dienst, and the UK Met Office.