Next five years set to be hottest on record: UN | World News

The period from 2023 to 2027 will almost certainly be the five warmest years on record, the United Nations warned on Wednesday, with a combination of greenhouse gases and El Niño contributing to soaring temperatures.

The United Nations’ World Meteorological Organization says global temperatures will soon exceed the more ambitious target set in the Paris climate agreement, with a two-thirds chance of exceeding it in the next five years.

The eight warmest years on record were all between 2015 and 2022 – but temperatures are expected to rise further as climate change accelerates.

“There is a 98 percent chance that at least one of the next five years, and the entire five-year period, will be the hottest on record,” the WMO said.

In the 2015 Paris Agreement, countries agreed to limit global warming to “well below” two degrees Celsius above the average measured between 1850 and 1900 — up to 1.5 degrees Celsius, if possible.

The global average temperature in 2022 is 1.15C warmer than the 1850-1900 average.

The World Meteorological Organization said there was a 66 per cent chance that global surface temperatures would rise by 1.5 degrees Celsius per year above pre-industrial levels for at least one year between 2023 and 2027, with annual warming projected to range from 1.1 degrees Celsius to 1.8 degrees Celsius.

‘Uncharted territory’

While that doesn’t mean the world will always exceed the Paris benchmark, “the World Meteorological Organization is sounding the alarm that we will temporarily breach the 1.5C level with increasing frequency,” said Petrit Taras, head of the agency .

“El Niño is expected in the coming months, which will combine with human-induced climate change to push global temperatures into uncharted territory.

“This will have profound implications for health, food security, water management and the environment. We need to be prepared.”

El Niño is a large-scale warming of surface temperatures in the central-eastern equatorial Pacific Ocean. This weather phenomenon usually occurs every two to seven years.

Conditions oscillate between El Niño and the opposite La Niña, with neutral conditions in between.

The World Meteorological Organization said earlier this month that there was a 60% chance of El Niño developing by the end of July and an 80% chance by the end of September.

Typically, an El Niño raises global temperatures within a year of its development — in this cycle, 2024.

While La Niña has had a cooling effect for most of the past three years, the eight warmest years on record all started in 2015, with 2016 being the warmest.

The heat is trapped in the atmosphere by so-called greenhouse gases, which are at an all-time high.

The three major greenhouse gases are carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide.

Temperatures have risen since the 1960s

Global land and ocean mean near surface temperatures have increased since the 1960s.

The probability of temperatures temporarily exceeding the 1850-1990 average by 1.5 degrees Celsius has risen steadily since 2015, a year considered close to zero.

The UK Met Office The National Met Office is the WMO lead center for annual to decadal climate predictions.

The Met Office says that while there is a 66% chance of the year between 2023 and 2027 exceeding the 1.5C threshold, there is now a 32% chance of the entire five-year average exceeding the 1.5C threshold.

“Average global temperatures are expected to continue to rise, taking us further and further away from the climate we are used to,” said Leon Hermanson, an expert scientist at the Met Office.

Temperatures in 2023 are likely to be above the 1991-2020 average in almost all regions except Alaska, South Africa, South Asia and parts of Australia, the World Meteorological Organization said.

Parts of the South Pacific could experience cooler-than-average temperatures.