Will we go above the 1.5 degree limit in 2026?
What was considered intolerable just a few years ago is becoming a possibility, UN climate experts say. Research suggests global average temperatures could rise above 1.5 degrees Celsius in the next four years.
More wildfires
According to the United Nations' World Meteorological Organization (WMO) in Geneva, there is nearly a 50% chance that at least one of the next five years will see an average global temperature of more than 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels. More wildfires, like this one in the Plumas National Forest in California in 2021, could be a result.
Extreme weather events
According to WMO Secretary-General Petteri Taalas, latest research suggests the world may temporarily go over the 1.5 degree Celsius limit, which had actually been set as an upper limit in the Paris climate accord. This is likely to result in more extreme weather, like this flooding after heavy rain in the Chinese city of Zhengzhou in 2021.
Damaged ecosystems
When the global community agreed in 2015 to limit warming to below 2 degrees Celsius, it was not clear that climate change would progress as rapidly as it has. The impact is evident in damaged ecosystems. In the Marmara Sea in Turkey, heavily polluted by wastewater, 60% of all animal species have disappeared.
Melting glaciers and ice caps
The WMO's Taalas is also concerned about the Arctic, where it has been unusually warm. For example, the Jakobshavn glacier in Greenland melted and released so much ice into the sea between 2000 and 2010, it alone caused a global sea-level rise of 1 millimeter. "What happens in the Arctic affects us all," Taalas said.
Fatal consequences
Increasingly, humans will be forced to deal with the impacts of climate change and extreme weather events, such as 2021's Hurricane Ida, which destroyed Theophilus Charles' Louisiana home (shown here). The WMO's Taalas warned that the 1.5 degree Celsius limit was not chosen randomly. It marks the point at which climate impacts become increasingly harmful for people and the planet.
Poor prospects for climate protection
The unsettling news from Geneva comes at the halfway point between COP26, the last World Climate Conference in Glasgow and the next one, COP27, in Egypt. Environment observers are watching with great concern, even as many Europeans focus on the war in Ukraine. No matter what happens next in eastern Europe, climate change will remain an ongoing emergency for all.