Prof Mark Maslin studies climate change and human impacts as professor of Earth system science at University College London (UCL) and the Natural History Museum of Denmark in Copenhagen. He recently partnered with the comedian Jo Brand in an online film to “translate” climate science for a wider audience. He is one of the lead organisers of Love Your Planet with Al Gore’s charity, the Climate Reality Project, and the Climate Cafe at UCL on 14 February.
We’ve just heard officially that 2023 was the world’s hottest year, and that we are likely to breach the temperature rise limit of 1.5C warming above pre-industrial levels in the next 12 months. What are your thoughts on that?
Last year being the hottest on record was something we knew was going to happen at the end of 2023. Two hundred of the 365 days last year were the hottest ever recorded for that particular day, which gives some idea of how huge this was. The temperature is 1.48C above the pre-industrial – close to the 1.5C limit [for this century] that was set up by the Paris agreement in 2016 – so we are worryingly close to it. We also know that El Niño [a natural weather pattern] is starting in the Pacific Ocean and always adds some warming. So in 2024, we could break the 1.5C limit temporarily.
