PARIS, May 8 (Alliance News) – Global temperatures continued to soar in April, with the EU’s climate monitor reporting that last month was the second hottest on record, signaling an ongoing trend of accelerated warming that is raising serious concerns about the future of the planet.
The Copernicus Climate Change Service noted that April’s heat kept global temperatures at near-record levels, continuing a historic streak of high temperatures.
Despite expectations that the warming effects of El Nino would subside, the world has remained locked in an exceptionally hot pattern well into 2025.
Johan Rockstrom, director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, expressed alarm over the persistent heat, saying, “We are stuck at an accelerated step-change in warming,” adding that the causes of this prolonged heatwave remain unclear but are deeply troubling.
April’s temperature anomaly was 1.39°C above pre-industrial levels, and scientists warn that the 1.5°C threshold set by the Paris Climate Agreement could be crossed sooner than anticipated.
Samantha Burgess of the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) predicted that 1.5°C could be reached by mid-2029. Burgess stressed the importance of focusing on limiting the rise beyond this critical threshold.
Research suggests the planet is on track to exceed 1.5°C by the end of the decade, a target that many scientists believe is no longer attainable.
While the surge in temperatures is linked primarily to fossil fuel emissions, scientists are also exploring other contributing factors, including changes in global cloud patterns and the planet’s ability to store carbon.
As the world braces for more extreme heatwaves, the urgency to combat climate change intensifies. Scientists agree that while the current warming rate is concerning, it remains within the boundaries of what climate models predicted, though it is nearing the upper limit.
