World Environment Day: Humans are warming the planet faster than ever before

The second annual Indicators of Global Climate Change report, led by the University of Leeds, has recently highlighted that human-induced warming has risen to 1.19°C over the past decade (2014-2023), up from 1.14°C in 2013-2022. 

In 2023 alone, warming reached 1.3°C due to human activity, while natural variability, including El Niño, contributed to a total warming of 1.43°C. The remaining carbon budget for limiting warming to 1.5°C is around 200 gigatons, equating to about five years of current emissions.

Global warming caused by human activities

“Our analysis shows that the level of global warming caused by human action has continued to increase over the past year, even though climate action has slowed the rise in greenhouse gas emissions. Global temperatures are still heading in the wrong direction and faster than ever before,” said lead author Piers Forster, Director of the Priestley Center for Climate Futures at the University of Leeds.

“Our analysis is designed to track the long-term trends caused by human activities. Observed temperatures are a product of this long-term trend modulated by shorter-term natural variations. Last year, when observed temperature records were broken, these natural factors were temporarily adding around 10% to the long-term warming,” he added.

The urgency of climate action 

The report underscores the urgency of climate action as experts gather in Bonn to prepare for the COP29 climate conference in Baku, Azerbaijan. 

The report addresses an “information gap” created by the delay in the next major assessment from the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) until around 2027. To fill this gap, the Climate Change Tracker’s Indicators of Global Climate Change dashboard provides updated information on key climate indicators.

The report also highlighted the effects of reduced sulfur emissions from global shipping, which previously had a cooling effect on the climate. Although offset by aerosol emissions from Canadian wildfires last year, the long-term trend shows a decline in this cooling effect.

Key findings of the report 

• Human-induced warming reached 1.19°C over the past decade, up from 1.14°C.
• This rate of warming is unprecedented in the instrumental record, at roughly 0.26°C per decade over 2014-2023.
• High greenhouse gas emissions, averaging 53 billion tons of CO2 per year, are driving this warming.
• Improved air quality has reduced human-caused cooling from atmospheric particles.
• Unprecedented heat flows into oceans, ice caps, soils, and the atmosphere, tracked by ocean buoys and satellites, exceeded long-term averages by 50%.

Limiting the rate of global warming

“Fossil fuel emissions are around 70% of all GHG emissions and clearly the main driver of climate change, but other sources of pollution from cement production, farming and deforestation and cuts to the level of sulfur emissions are also contributing to warming,” Forster explained.

“Rapidly reducing emissions of greenhouse gasses towards net zero will limit the level of global warming we ultimately experience. At the same time, we need to build more resilient societies. The devastation wrought by wildfires, drought, flooding and heat waves the world saw in 2023 must not become the new normal.”

The report, published in the journal Earth System Science Data, aims to inform new Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) that countries will submit to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) by 2025 to cut emissions and adapt to climate impacts.

World Environment Day 

In 1972, Stockholm, Sweden hosted the first global conference to focus on the environment as a major issue. This pivotal assembly, referred to as the Stockholm Conference, reflected a growing interest in conservation issues worldwide.

The conference ignited a movement that led to the creation of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and established June 5th as World Environment Day.

In light of the findings from the Indicators of Global Climate Change report, the need to mitigate human influence on the climate system could not be more urgent. 

“Time is running out, and nature is in emergency mode. To keep global warming below 1.5°C this century, we must halve annual greenhouse gas emissions by 2030,” stated UNEP.

“Unless greenhouse gas emissions fall dramatically, warming could pass 2.9°C this century, which would have catastrophic consequences for life on this planet.”

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