2024 is the hottest year on record — so far. The World MeteorologicalOrganization (WMO) confirmed that 2024 was the world’s hottest year since records began, with the global average reaching 1.55°C above pre-industrial levels — breaching the 1.5C limit agreed at the 2015 Paris Agreement.

(Tap or click the headline above to read this story with all of the links to external sources.)

The 1.5°C limit explained: The 2015 Paris Climate Agreement agreed on the target of limiting temperature increases to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels as essentially a “ defense line.” Climate experts believe that keeping it below that limit will help the world avoid “the more extreme and irreversible climate effects that would occur with a 2°C increase.”

Is it really that big of a deal? Consider how experiencing a fever of two degrees above our baseline affects our bodies. While one or two degrees may seem like a small margin to worry about, a permanent increase will have cascading effects on the planet as we know it. Every tenth of a degree counts, and every fractional increase will lead to worse climate impacts, scientist Zeke Hausfather told the BBC — no doubt exacerbated if the 1.5C threshold continues to be broken.

What’s behind the rise? It seems the usual suspect of corporate-driven CO2 emissions has picked up pace, but the rise was also attributed to the El Niño climate phenomenon — a weather pattern from the Pacific Ocean that temporarily heated oceans and drove up temperatures. Its sister, La Niña, is expected to hit in the US in the coming year, according to Forbes.

It’ll only get hotter, with more extreme weather patterns like droughts and wildfires set to continue, the National Geographic reports — look no further than California for evidence of once rare natural disasters becoming regular occurrences. Climate change is behind the US’s increasingly common wildfire outbreaks, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration states, but the fires are also exacerbating the problem — wildfires added 5.3 bn tonnes of CO2 to the atmosphere in 2022, according to Carbon Brief.

Geopolitical tension is also a culprit: Israel’s assault on Gaza also has an “ immense ” effect on the climate, and the emission output of repairing the damage stands at 60 mn tonnes of CO2 — the first two months of the war released more emissions than 26 climate-vulnerable nations do in a year, with Israel responsible for 90% of these.

The new normal? Scientists are noticing a phenomenon of “shifting baseline syndrome,” meaning that we are becoming increasingly accustomed to hotter weather and weirder weather patterns. This means we’re perhaps becoming less perceptive of these changes.

Tags: