“Exceptional” Global Warming Spike Continued in 2024
Global average temperatures in 2024 were the hottest on record, surpassing the previous record set in 2023 by a clear margin. In three global temperature assessments released on 10 January, climate scientists reported that temperatures across the world rose faster than expected, reaching 1.46°C–1.62°C above the preindustrial baseline.
“The long-term trends are very, very clear,” Gavin Schmidt, director of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies, told reporters at a 10 January briefing. “It’s warming more over the land than it is over the ocean. It’s warming more in the Northern Hemisphere, where there’s more land, than in the Southern Hemisphere, where there is less. And it’s warming most of all in the Arctic regions.”
In both 2023 and 2024, global average temperatures were hotter than expected, bucking the linear heating trend that had persisted for decades. Scientists believe that a combination of factors—but primarily record high greenhouse gas emissions—contributed to the recent warming acceleration.
