Earth on the brink of key warming threshold after year of ‘chart-busting’ extremes, researchers say

A series of climate records last year gave new meaning to the phrase “off the charts,” the U.N.’s weather agency said on Tuesday, warning that the planet is now on the brink of surpassing a key warming threshold.

In its annual “State of the Global Climate” report, researchers at the World Meteorological Organization outlined how extreme weather events in 2023 wreaked havoc for millions of people across the globe and inflicted billions of dollars in economic losses.

The WMO said records were broken, and in some cases smashed, for indicators such as greenhouse gas levels, ocean heat and acidification, sea level rise, Antarctic Sea ice cover and glacier retreat.

It confirmed 2023 as the hottest year on record and said the period from 2014 to 2023 also reflected the hottest 10-year period on record.

The global average temperature in 2023 stood at 1.45 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, researchers said, marginally below the key warming threshold of 1.5 degrees Celsius.

The 1.5 degrees Celsius level is widely recognized as an indicator of when climate impacts become increasingly harmful to people and the planet, as outlined in the landmark Paris Agreement.

Extreme temperatures are fueled by the climate crisis, the chief driver of which is the burning of fossil fuels.

“Never have we been so close — albeit on a temporary basis at the moment — to the 1.5° C lower limit of the Paris Agreement on climate change,” WMO Secretary-General Celeste Saulo said in a statement.

“The WMO community is sounding the Red Alert to the world,” she said.

“Climate change is about much more than temperatures. What we…