The year 2024 was the world’s warmest on record globally, and the first calendar year in which global temperatures exceeded 1.5°C above its pre-industrial levels.
The official declaration was made on Friday by the Copernicus Climate Change Service, the European Union’s Earth observation program. It comes as wildfires continue to tear through Los Angeles, California – a disaster scientists say was made worse by climate change.
This record-breaking global heat is primarily driven by humanity’s ongoing greenhouse gas emissions, caused by the burning of fossil fuels. The warming won’t stop until we reach net-zero emissions.
