2024 On Track To Be World's Hottest Year On Record: EU Scientists

New Delhi: The year 2024 is on track to become the warmest ever recorded, according to the European Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S), which issued the statement on Thursday.

C3S declared that 2024 is ‘virtually certain’ to surpass 2023 as the hottest year since records began. This announcement comes just days ahead of the U.N. COP29 climate summit in Azerbaijan, where nations will negotiate major funding increases to combat climate change. However, the outcome of these talks could be affected by Donald Trump 's recent victory in the U.S. presidential election.

Data from C3S reveals that the average global temperature from January to October was already so high that only a dramatic temperature decline in the year's final months could prevent 2024 from setting a new record. “The fundamental, underpinning cause of this year’s record is climate change,” said Carlo Buontempo, director of C3S, in an interview with Reuters. “The climate is warming globally—in all continents and ocean basins—which inevitably leads to record-breaking temperatures,” he added.

The year 2024 will also likely be the first in which global temperatures exceed 1.5°C above the pre-industrial average of 1850-1900, a period marking the beginning of large-scale fossil fuel consumption. Carbon dioxide emissions from burning fossil fuels remain the primary driver of this warming.

Sonia Seneviratne, a climate scientist from ETH Zurich, expressed concern but not surprise at the new milestone. She emphasized the need for stronger climate action at COP29 to accelerate the transition away from CO2-emitting energy sources. “The targets set in the Paris Agreement are crumbling due to the inadequate pace of climate measures worldwide,” she warned.

The 2015 Paris Agreement aimed to prevent global temperatures from rising more than 1.5°C (2.7°F) to mitigate severe climate impacts. While the world has not yet breached this average temperature limit—defined over decades—C3S anticipates that it will be exceeded by around 2030. “It's basically around the corner now,” Buontempo noted.

Even slight temperature increases exacerbate extreme weather events. In October, catastrophic flash floods in Spain claimed hundreds of lives, record-breaking wildfires devastated Peru, and severe flooding in Bangladesh destroyed over a million tons of rice, causing food prices to soar. Meanwhile, in the United States, Hurricane Milton intensified due to human-induced climate change.

C3S, which has temperature records dating back to 1940, corroborates its findings with global datasets stretching back to 1850.

With inputs from Reuters…