New Delhi:

The world experienced an average of 41 more days of extreme heat in 2024 due to climate change, a new report said on Friday. According to the European climate agency Copernicus, 2024 is set to end as the warmest year on record and the first year with a global average temperature of 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels.

A yearly review report by two groups of climate scientists — World Weather Attribution (WWA) and Climate Central — said the world saw an average of 41 more days of dangerous heat in 2024.

Small island developing states were hit the hardest, with their people experiencing over 130 additional hot days.

The scientists identified 219 extreme weather events in 2024 and studied 29 of them. They found that climate change contributed to at least 3,700 deaths and displaced millions in 26 extreme weather events.

“It is likely the total number of people killed in extreme weather events intensified by climate change this year is in the tens or hundreds of thousands,” the report said.

The floods in Sudan, Nigeria, Niger, Cameroon, and Chad were the deadliest event studied by the group, with at least 2,000 people killed.

The study found that if global warming reached two degrees Celsius, which could happen as early as the 2040s or 2050s, these regions might face similar heavy rainfall events every year.

Friederike Otto, lead of WWA and senior lecturer in climate science at the Imperial College, London, said, “The impacts of fossil fuel warming have never been clearer or more devastating than in 2024. We are living in a dangerous new era.” “We know exactly what we need to do to stop things from getting worse — stop burning fossil fuels. The top resolution for 2025 must be transitioning away from fossil fuels, which will make the world a safer and more stable place,” he added.

The year 2024 is expected to end with a global average temperature at least 1.55 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, according to Copernicus.

However, a permanent breach of the 1.5-degree Celsius limit specified in the Paris Agreement refers to long-term warming over a 20- or 30-year period.

That said, experts feel that the world is now entering a phase where temperatures will be consistently above this threshold.

The average global temperature has already risen by 1.3 degrees Celsius compared to the 1850-1900 average, driven by the rapid buildup of greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide and methane in the atmosphere.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the UN body for assessing the science related to climate change, says global emissions must peak by 2025 and reduce by 43 per cent by 2030 and 57 per cent by 2035 compared to 2019 levels to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius.

However, according to the latest UN data, current policies will take global warming to around 3 degrees Celsius by 2100.

Even the full implementation of all Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) or national climate plans will likely lead to just a 5.9 per cent emission reduction by 2030 compared to 2019 levels, according to the synthesis report of countries’ NDCs.

Fossil fuels — coal, oil, and gas — are the largest contributors to climate change, accounting for over 75 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions and nearly 90 per cent of all carbon dioxide emissions.

However, the world is struggling to transition away from fossil fuels rapidly enough to prevent breaching the 1.5-degree Celsius goal due to a combination of political, economic, technological, and social challenges.

The transition to clean energy sources is particularly difficult for poor countries in the Global South due to dependence on fossil fuels for jobs and cheap energy, lack of funding and technology, weak power grids, and limited expertise.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Baku:

The year 2024 is on course to become the hottest year ever recorded, with global temperatures reaching unprecedented levels, the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) warned.

According to a report released on the opening day of the UN Climate Change Conference (COP29) here, the January-September global mean surface temperature was 1.54 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels.

This alarming surge, driven by an intense El Nino event and rising greenhouse gas concentrations, marks a critical threshold for climate change impacts worldwide.

The report titled “State of the Climate 2024” highlights the accelerating risks posed by global warming, particularly for vulnerable communities. “Climate catastrophe is hammering health, widening inequalities, harming sustainable development, and rocking the foundations of peace,” said UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres.

Guterres emphasised the urgent need for climate action to protect those most affected by these changes.

A major finding of the report is the unprecedented temperature increase. The average global temperature for the first nine months of 2024 exceeded the pre-industrial level by 1.54 degrees Celsius, temporarily surpassing the 1.5 degrees Celsius goal set in the Paris Agreement.

Though long-term warming remains around 1.3 degrees Celsius, experts caution that every fraction of a degree compounds the intensity of extreme weather events and exacerbates climate risks.

Another key observation is the surge in ocean heat content, which reached a historic high in 2023 and shows no signs of abating in 2024.

Oceans have absorbed over 90 per cent of the extra energy from global warming, a trend that will have long-term implications for marine life and coastal communities.

Rising ocean temperatures also fuel extreme weather patterns, further intensifying climate challenges.

Sea levels, driven by thermal expansion and glacier melt, continue to rise at a rate more than double that observed between 1993 and 2002.

Although the rate of increase slightly slowed in 2024, the WMO warns that sea level rise remains a grave concern for coastal regions worldwide. This trend underscores the need for coastal communities to strengthen resilience against rising waters.

The WMO report also draws attention to unprecedented glacier loss, with a record 1.2 metres of water equivalent lost in 2023.

Glaciers in Switzerland, for example, lost approximately 10 per cent of their remaining volume over just two years. Such rapid glacier retreat impacts mountainous and polar regions, highlighting the urgency for climate adaptation measures in these vulnerable areas.

Extreme weather events have also intensified globally, with WMO attributing deadly heatwaves, severe floods, tropical cyclones, and persistent droughts to climate change. These events have led to economic losses, food insecurity, and forced migration, hindering sustainable development and causing significant human suffering.

Additionally, greenhouse gas concentrations reached record levels in 2023, with CO2 rising to 420 parts per million, marking a 51 per cent increase from pre-industrial levels. This trend has persisted into 2024, pushing atmospheric heat retention higher and driving further warming. Such findings underline the pressing need to curb emissions on a global scale.

The polar ice regions continue to experience dramatic changes. Antarctic sea ice extent in 2024 was the second lowest since satellite records began, with the Arctic also seeing near-record lows. The loss of polar ice contributes to global warming feedback loops, with cascading effects on ecosystems and weather patterns.

WMO Secretary-General Celeste Saulo emphasised the need for climate adaptation, particularly through initiatives like Early Warnings for All (EW4All), which aim to protect communities from extreme weather events.

As part of this initiative, 108 countries now report having a Multi-Hazard Early Warning System, a significant step towards enhancing resilience in vulnerable areas.

The WMO’s findings underscore the urgency of reducing greenhouse gas emissions and implementing effective climate policies. In response, a team of international experts has been convened to track and communicate climate goals relative to the Paris Agreement and guide policymakers.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

File picture of a volunteer pouring water to cool a man off during a hot day in Karachi, Pakistan. 2024 will be first year over 1.5 degree Celsius hotter than pre-industrial period
| Photo Credit: AP

This year is “virtually certain” to eclipse 2023 as the world’s warmest since records began, the European Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) said on Thursday (November 7, 2024). The data was released ahead of next week’s U.N. COP29 climate summit in Azerbaijan, where countries will try to agree a huge increase in funding to tackle climate change. Donald Trump’s victory in the U.S. presidential election has dampened expectations for the talks.

C3S said that from January to October, the average global temperature had been so high that 2024 was sure to be the world’s hottest year — unless the temperature anomaly in the rest of the year plunged to near-zero.

“The fundamental, underpinning cause of this year’s record is climate change,” C3S Director Carlo Buontempo told Reuters.

“The climate is warming, generally. It’s warming in all continents, in all ocean basins. So we are bound to see those records being broken,” he said.

The scientists said 2024 will also be the first year in which the planet is more than 1.5C hotter than in the 1850-1900 pre-industrial period, when humans began burning fossil fuels on an industrial scale.

ALSO READ: Zeroing in on methane diplomacy, at COP29 

Carbon dioxide emissions from burning coal, oil and gas are the main cause of global warming.

Sonia Seneviratne, a climate scientist at public research university ETH Zurich, said she was not surprised by the milestone, and urged governments at COP29 to agree stronger action to wean their economies off CO2-emitting fossil fuels.

“The limits that were set in the Paris agreement are starting to crumble given the too-slow pace of climate action across the world,” Ms. Seneviratne said.

Countries agreed in the 2015 Paris Agreement to try to prevent global warming surpassing 1.5C (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit), to avoid its worst consequences.

The world has not breached that target – which refers to an average global temperature of 1.5C over decades – but C3S now expects the world to exceed the Paris goal around 2030.

“It’s basically around the corner now,” Mr. Buontempo said.

Every fraction of temperature increase fuels extreme weather. In October, catastrophic flash floods killed hundreds of people in Spain, record wildfires tore through Peru, and flooding in Bangladesh destroyed more than 1 million tons of rice, sending food prices skyrocketing. In the U.S., Hurricane Milton was also worsened by human-caused climate change.

C3S’ records go back to 1940, which are cross-checked with global temperature records going back to 1850.

Labourers sleep on the roadside during an early hot summer morning in Karachi, Pakistan. Pakistan port city Karachi and some other parts of the country continued to experience heatwave these days. File
| Photo Credit: AP

The world experienced an average of 26 more days of extreme heat over the last 12 months that would probably not have occurred without climate change, a report said on May 28.

Heat is the leading cause of climate-related death and the report further points to the role of global warming in increasing the frequency and intensity of extreme weather around the world.

For this study, scientists used the years 1991 to 2020 to determine what temperatures counted as within the top 10 per cent for each country over that period.

Next, they looked at the 12 months to May 15, 2024, to establish how many days over that period experienced temperatures within — or beyond — the previous range.

Then, using peer-reviewed methods, they examined the influence of climate change on each of these excessively hot days.

They concluded that “human-caused climate change added — on average, across all places in the world — 26 more days of extreme heat than there would have been without it”.

The report was published by the Red Cross Red Crescent Climate Centre, the World Weather Attribution scientific network and the nonprofit research organisation Climate Central.

2023 was the hottest year on record, according to the European Union’s climate monitor, Copernicus.

Already this year, extreme heatwaves have afflicted swathes of the globe from Mexico to Pakistan.

The report said that in the last 12 months, some 6.3 billion people — roughly 80% of the global population — experienced at least 31 days of what is classed as extreme heat.

In total, 76 extreme heatwaves were registered in 90 different countries on every continent except Antarctica.

Five of the most affected nations were in Latin America.

The report said that without the influence of climate change, Suriname would have recorded an estimated 24 extreme heat days instead of 182; Ecuador 10 not 180; Guyana 33 not 174, El Salvador 15 not 163; and Panama 12 not 149.

“[Extreme heat] is known to have killed tens of thousands of people over the last 12 months but the real number is likely in the hundreds of thousands or even millions,” the Red Cross said in a statement.

“Flooding and hurricanes may capture the headlines but the impacts of extreme heat are equally deadly,” said Jagan Chapagain, secretary general of the International Federation of the Red Cross.