The year 2024 has now been confirmed to have breached the 1.5 degree Celsius global warming threshold, becoming the first calendar year to do so.The annual average temperature of Earth’s surface in 2024 was 1.6 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial times (average of the 1850-1900 period), according to data from the Copernicus Climate Change Service run by the European Centre for Medium Range Weather Forecasting (ECMWF).The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) used six datasets, including the one used by ECMWF, to conclude that 2024 was 1.55 degrees Celsius warmer than pre-industrial levels. Each of the six datasets found 2024 to be the warmest year ever, but not all of them recorded the warming to be in excess of 1.5 degrees Celsius.An arbitrary markThe 1.5 degree mark is an arbitrarily decided threshold. In terms of climate change impacts, there is nothing new that will begin to happen once this threshold is crossed. Science only says that the climate impacts are expected to become more severe and frequent as warming increases.The 2024 breach does not mean that the 1.5 degree target is over. This target, mentioned in the 2015 Paris Agreement, refers to long-term temperature trends, usually over two to three decades, not annual or monthly averages.The breach does not come as a surprise. The WMO as been saying for more than two years now that this threshold was almost certain to be crossed before 2027.As a result, this new data is unlikely to trigger any fresh response measures from countries to deal with the problem of climate change — something that has so far been severely inadequate.AdvertisementGlobal emissions are still on the rise, and the 2030 emission cut targets are almost certain to be missed. Therefore, there is every likelihood that the breach that has happened in 2024 would become a norm within the next decade.“One or two years that exceed 1.5 degrees Celsius above the pre-industrial level does not imply that the Paris Agreement has been breached. However, with the current rate of warming at more than 0.2 degrees Celsius per decade, the probability of breaching the 1.5 degree target of the Paris Agreement within the 2030s is highly likely,” the ECMWF said in a statement.2023, 2024 exceptionally warmThe year 2024 has now become the warmest year ever, taking over from 2023 which was 1.45 degrees Celsius warmer than pre-industrial levels. Together, these two years were exceptionally warm, and witnessed several record-breaking temperature events. Every month since July 2023, with the exception of July 2024, has been more than 1.5 degrees Celsius warmer than the corresponding monthly average of pre-industrial times.The years 2023 and 2024 stand out even in the rapidly warming trend witnessed in the last decade, ECMWF said. For instance, the previous warmest year, 2016, which was 1.29 degrees Celsius warmer than pre-industrial levels, was influenced by a very strong El Niño — a periodic oceanic phenomenon in the eastern Paci
