Over the weekend, a prominent European climate scientist announced that the planet’s temperature briefly reached the threshold of a key climate barrier for the first time late last week.
Climate tracking: In accordance with the alterations in the climate over time. (Source: USA Today/NASA)
2 Degree Celsius Exceeds the Threshold
Samantha Burgess, deputy director of Copernicus Climate Change Service, announced Friday that the world reached 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 F) over preindustrial levels for the first time. Burgess wrote on X, formerly Twitter, on Sunday that their best estimate is that the world temperature was greater over 2°C above 1850-1900 (or pre-industrial) values on this day, at 2.06°C. NASA says “A 2-degree rise in global temperatures is considered a critical threshold above which dangerous and cascading effects of human-generated climate change will occur,” which the world wishes to avoid. CNN was informed by Burgess that a single day of warming that is greater than two degrees does not constitute a violation of the Paris Agreement; but, it does underline the fact that we are getting closer and closer to the limitations that have been agreed upon internationally. There will likely be more days with temperatures of 1.5 and 2 degrees in the coming months and years.
A separate U.N. assessment issued Monday estimated that Earth is already warming at 2.5 C to 2.9 C (4.5 F to 5.2 F) since preindustrial times, considerably above the 1.5-degree international temperature threshold. U.N. Secretary-General Antãnio Guterres stated that the 1.5-degree limit is still achievable. It involves removing fossil fuels, the cause of the climate issue. It needs a fair renewables transition.”
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