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Earth Science

Temperatures 1.5C Above Pre-industrial Era Average For 12 Months, Data Shows (theguardian.com) 119

Posted by msmash from the everything-getting-worse dept.
The world has baked for 12 consecutive months in temperatures 1.5C (2.7F) greater than their average before the fossil fuel era, new data shows. Temperatures between July 2023 and June 2024 were the highest on record, scientists found, creating a year-long stretch in which the Earth was 1.64C hotter than in preindustrial times. From a report: The findings do not mean world leaders have already failed to honour their promises to stop the planet heating 1.5C by the end of the century -- a target that is measured in decadal averages rather than single years -- but that scorching heat will have exposed more people to violent weather. A sustained rise in temperatures above this level also increases the risk of uncertain but catastrophic tipping points.

Carlo Buontempo, director of the Copernicus Climate Change Service, which analysed the data, said the results were not a statistical oddity but a "large and continuing shift" in the climate. "Even if this specific streak of extremes ends at some point, we are bound to see new records being broken as the climate continues to warm," he said. "This is inevitable unless we stop adding greenhouse gases into the atmosphere and the oceans." Copernicus, a scientific organisation that belongs to the EU's space programme, uses billions of measurements from satellites, ships, aircraft and weather stations to track key climate metrics. It found June 2024 was hotter than any other June on record and was the 12th month in a row with temperatures 1.5C greater than their average between 1850 and 1900. Because temperatures in some months had "relatively small margins" above 1.5C, the scientists said, datasets from other climate agencies may not confirm the 12-month temperature streak.
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Temperatures 1.5C Above Pre-industrial Era Average For 12 Months, Data Shows More

Temperatures 1.5C Above Pre-industrial Era Average For 12 Months, Data Shows

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  • They say they do, but are they willing to stay home?

    "Exactly 3,013,413 flight passengers stepped through TSA checkpoints, surpassing the previous record of 2.99 million set on June 23. Sunday was a one-day record, but TSA officials said 2024 has been a historic year all around. Nine of the 10 busiest days in TSA history have happened this year, starting on May 25 when agents screened roughly 2.9 million travelers. "

    https://www.cbsnews.com/news/t... [cbsnews.com]

    On the other hand we still have more to go to match the Holo

    • Re:No one really cares, (Score:5, Insightful)

      by hdyoung ( 5182939 ) on Monday July 08, 2024 @01:24PM (#64610333)
      The problem is too large for individual actions to mean much. This will require civilization-level and species-level changes. Government-level actions will be needed, like it or not. Otherwise, it'll just happen in an uncontrolled fashion and every country/state/city/population/culture will adapt on their own.
      • The problem is that the problem has not clearly been defined. There's correlation. But no direct causal nexus has been found. So everyone uses it to their advantage. And any information that suggests the real answer, is discredited because it doesn't push a narrative: no good crisis is wasted.
      • If every person shows responsibility and takes action, it'll all add up. But yes, you'll need government action because there are too many selfish shits out there who won't do anything.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by gtall ( 79522 )

      Holocene Climatic Optimum : 9,000 to 5,000 years ago -- No modern civilization, pop. was less than that of the Roman Empire which was 59-76 million.
      Sangamon Interglacial : 130,000-115,000 years ago -- sure there were modern humans but even less than the Holocene
      Pliocene : 5.3 to 2.6 million years ago -- no humans unless you wish to count the Australopithecines

      Now, what is this bullshit that we can somehow "survive" an increase in temperature? Who will survive, you and your buddies?

      • Anybody who actively adapts, with either technology or by having enough members of the species for random mutations to work, will survive. Anybody who refuses to adapt, will die. This is basic evolution. What part of it do you not understand?

      • Now, what is this bullshit that we can somehow "survive" an increase in temperature?

        What you see as a disadvantage to survival - no modern civilization - I see as a huge advantage. Back in the Holocene the only option was to pick up and move and, with no science or knowledge of the planet beyond what you could see, which direction to move in and how far to move was a complete unknown. Not to mention that moving would be at the walking pace of the slowest member of your tribe.

        Today, not only can we identify where it would be good to move to but you can probably be there in 24 hours even

    • We do a lot of damage in a lot of different ways. Singling out one specific practice doesn't win you friends or solve the problem, it just pits people against each other.

      Next week I'm getting on a plane. I won't be staying at home. I will be flying 8 hours which gives a rough estimate of 800kg CO2 emissions for me personally.
      Do you own a car? I don't. I gave it up. So despite my flight I'll be emitting 3.8 tonnes less CO2 than the average person commuting to work this year. Do you have an air-conditioning?

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by antdude ( 79039 )

      I haven't flown since the summer of 1993! I don't like going out far.

  • 1.5 C is just a conveniently round number. Nothing catastrophic happens at 1.5 C. It is worse than 1.4 C but not as bad as 1.6 C, but it's not a particular tipping point such that if we exceed it, we're doomed and nothing can be done.

    The greater the degree of warming, the greater the problems, and the harder the problems will be to deal with. But don't obsess about that 1.5 C target, it's just one step on the warming.

    • Re:1.5 C is just a conveniently round number (Score:4, Informative)

      by Merk42 ( 1906718 ) on Monday July 08, 2024 @12:33PM (#64610121)
      1.4 C, 1.6 C, doesn't matter. We'll be at 15 C and still nothing will be done.

      • Re:1.5 C is just a conveniently round number (Score:5, Interesting)

        by Rick Schumann ( 4662797 ) on Monday July 08, 2024 @01:09PM (#64610273) Journal
        Eventually it will become a self-solving problem. If things get bad enough people will start dying in droves. Eventually the number of surviving humans will drop to the point where they can't do damage anymore. Of course that number may drop to the point where we can't even sustain our species -- or it may drop to zero. After that, in a few hundred thousand years, the planet may recover on it's own, and some other species may emerge as dominant, in which case good luck to them and their civilization -- assuming they have one.
        • I, for one, welcome our lizard people overlords.

          • ..lizard-people overlords

            We already have those; examples are Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg, and the vast majority of the U.S. Republican Party.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by Torodung ( 31985 )

            Yes. They are warming up the planet to make it more survivable for their cold-blooded biological homeostasis. With their space lasers.

            It's got nothing to do with carbon!

        • Unlikely. Even the worst case scenarios generally don't involve a venus-like end state. If things get super bad, poor countries will become straight-up uninhabitable. Population will definitely plummet because rich countries aren't going to accept literally billions of refugees The rich countries will need to switch to solar and nuclear for power, because at that point concerns about nuclear power will be straight-up ignored. AC will become a requirement for survival, rather than a luxury. In general, huma

        • It's possible that this may have already happened to some extent. The Roman Empire didn't have the Industrial Revolution that catapulted us in to the high tech age, but they did have some amazing industrial scale with the tech they had. That, combined with the empires in Asia that led to the development of the Silk Road may have contributed to the Medieval Warm Period. However, it inexplicably turned cold. Was that the system's way of reacting to all that activity? Did we accidentally change climate ba

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Torodung ( 31985 )

          Ah yes. An answer to the Fermi Paradox [wikipedia.org] that is extremely popular with Slashdotters.

          When I want to freak out someone who doesn't know better, I tell them that Venus did carbon and Mars did nuclear war, and we are merely the third planet to sustain life.

          It's nonsense, but it's fun to watch their faces.

        • Thank you. My descendants honor your sacrifice as you leave our planet to better pastures.
      • They've claimed the world will end for decades. It's not that things don't change. It's that people aren't lemmings who fall off a cliff.

    • Re:1.5 C is just a conveniently round number (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Darinbob ( 1142669 ) on Monday July 08, 2024 @01:11PM (#64610281)

      1.5C is a lot. For a human, you will feel the difference, it can be the difference between a comfortable day and an uncomfortably hot one. However for the weather, this is a massive difference. It's the temperature average of the entire globe, all the land, all the oceans. The total amount of energy here is immense, it will absolutely change the weather, it will change environments, whether or not someone in Frozen Nuts North Dakota is happy that it's slightly warmer.

      The problem with the numbers is that they are hard to comprehend by the average person. It feels like a tiny number, it feels like it's just a random number chosen by someone generating hysteria, but even 1.0C is massive. "Feels" is not the appropriate measurement standard here.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Pascoea ( 968200 )

        1.5C is a lot. For a human, you will feel the difference, it can be the difference between a comfortable day and an uncomfortably hot one.

        I've always heard it's not the heat, it's the humidity.

        • And 1.5C means more water can be retained in the atmosphere as well, thus higher humidity. Which is why the increase in temps also means stronger storms.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by Pascoea ( 968200 )
            It was a joke. At least an attempt at one, lol.

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by GoTeam ( 5042081 )
              I appreciated it. Now on a more serious note, everyone needs to grab some orange spray paint and glue themselves to the closest work of art or roadway!
      • Its a lot because its an average, some places will be a lot hotter and some a lot cooler and wetter

    • Re:1.5 C is just a conveniently round number (Score:5, Insightful)

      by MightyMartian ( 840721 ) on Monday July 08, 2024 @01:23PM (#64610327) Journal

      We're talking about a global average rise to that level. This isn't the temperature in your living room, this is the surface and lower atmospheric temperature of an entire planet. Try to fathom the amount of additional energy in the form of solar radiation being capture, and the amount of CO2 and other GHGs to capture it. You're missing the context and the scale, and in fact minimizing the enormity by orders of a magnitude.

      • Re: (Score:3)

        by GlennC ( 96879 )

        Try to fathom the amount of additional energy in the form of solar radiation being capture, and the amount of CO2 and other GHGs to capture it.

        Unfortunately, there are a lot of people who are completely incapable of doing this.

        And by "a lot" I mean MOST people are incapable of thinking on the scale necessary to realize just how screwed we are.

      • First, kudos for correct use of the word "enormity."

        I'm not trying to minimize the impact of the problem, I am trying to stop people from saying "if we exceed 1.5 C we're all going to die!", which inevitably draws the concomitant "we exceeded 1.5 C and didn't die, therefore it was all scare tactics, there really isn't a problem." Or, just as bad, "they said we needed to solve the problem before we reached 1.5C of warming or it's too late, but that happened, so it's too late to do anything."

        There is nothin

        • I despise the fact that you're right that 1.5C is a lost hope.

          I hate the psychopathic liars who made it a lost hope with the fire of a thousand suns.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by Torodung ( 31985 )

            It's not psychopathy. At the risk of sounding supercilious, it's just dumb dumbs who hate change and want their free lunches.

            Hardest lesson to learn: "There is no free lunch, only very rich people who made their fortune selling that myth to suckers."

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Torodung ( 31985 )

          Yup. We're not doing 1.5C. Not happening.

          I suspect climate scientists are normal humans and may be unconsciously underestimating the avg rise and rapidity of the results, especially once certain tipping points are reached. I also suspect we do not know all of the tipping points, only the big and obvious ones. Encouragingly, also not all of the self-correction the planet can do on its own. We're still in the low-hanging fruit stage of the field.

          I hope the human race survives this, but 1.5C isn't going to kil

          • I suspect climate scientists are normal humans and may be unconsciously underestimating the avg rise and rapidity of the results

            Oh it's conscious, they are fully aware they are underestimating it - and they say so explicitly in most studies. "This study does not examine the possible effects of [foo]. Further work is needed to clarify the potential impact of [bar] on these results."

        • 1.5C is an average across the globe so some places are experiencing a lot more increased heat than that, if it keeps going up there is going to be a lot of migration from the hot places to the cooler places.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by HiThere ( 15173 )

      Actually, it MAY be worse. We don't know where the real "tipping point"s are. Perhaps this is one that will set the permafrost into "generate huge amounts of methane" mode. We know that there are feedback loops that are intensified at higher temperatures, but those things aren't linear, and we don't really understand how they work. We have models that "sort of" work within a certain range of temperatures, but we're moving outside the range that they've been validated on.

      But, yeah, it's PROBABLY just a n

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by XXongo ( 3986865 )

        Actually, it MAY be worse. We don't know where the real "tipping point"s are.

        Yes, and this is an absolutely horrifying thing to keep in mind. There probably-- almost certainly-- are tipping points, and we don't know where they are.

        The climate skeptics keep saying "look at the huge error bars. It might not be all that bad." But, also keep in mind, it very well might be worse than the average case predictions. Possibly far worse.

        Perhaps this is one that will set the permafrost into "generate huge amounts of methane" mode. We know that there are feedback loops that are intensified at higher temperatures, but those things aren't linear, and we don't really understand how they work. We have models that "sort of" work within a certain range of temperatures, but we're moving outside the range that they've been validated on.
        But, yeah, it's PROBABLY just a notable number. Thinking of the system as linear, though, it really a bad way to think of it, even if (or because) we don't understand exactly how it works.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Torodung ( 31985 )

          In hope, we also don't know what kind of carbon mitigation the planet itself is capable of, so maybe those tipping points cause other mitigating tipping points.

          Just don't call me when you wake up and your front lawn is now sentient. I'll be too busy dealing with the 6 inches of weird purple dust that we have to clean off my entire town.

          There is SO MUCH we don't know.

    • Warming doesn't matter. The distribution of the warming does.

      My oven is really really hot. It raises the average temperature of my house significantly. But I don't need to turn on my AC when I run my oven.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Torodung ( 31985 )

        The atmosphere is a chaotic system. Imagine your oven temperature moving from room to room instead of staying in your oven. Your air conditioning isn't designed for it and the planet isn't designed for such instability in that same way.

        • Okay, so we both agree that it's the distribution of warming that matters, not the absolute average change. That's a good start.

          But do you really believe that temperature can randomly drift across the globe with no restraint?

          Do you really believe we could have a day where it is colder at the equator that it is at the poles?

          I'm not sure if you understand what "chaotic" means. Your inability to predict the exact state of a system at time T because you don't know what the exact starting conditions are and ev

      • My oven is really really hot. It raises the average temperature of my house significantly.

        Unless your oven is particularly large or your house is particularly small, no, it doesn't. Even in a fairly small apartment, the oven is about 0.1% of the total volume, so having the oven at 500F raise the average temperature of the apartment by less than 0.5F.

        • You bring up a really good point - statistical significance doesn't always seem "significant". 0.5F, or 1.5C, is a swing we can encounter just walking through our house from one room to another, even if it can be measured.

          But surely you can understand the difference between raising the temperature evenly 0.5F in my house, and raising only 5 cubic feet of that house to 500F - one of them is dangerous, the other one simply isn't. Distribution is what matters, not average change.

          Averages of numbers throw awa

  • The reason why I ask that was that it appears during the Dark Ages of Europe, the summer temperatures were unusually warm (supposedly warmer than now), result in very long crop growing seasons. The result was a surprisingly stable European population given the effects of the collapse of the Western Roman Empire.

  • Dammit, if the serfs would just go back to living in caves like they're supposed to, the wealthy could continue their jet-setting, yachting habits unabated.

  • It is perhaps sweet justice that the trolls whining here are exactly the people who are dumb and poor enough to suffer most through the climate catastrophe, but the more applicable lesson is the one to be learned from the Bible: it makes no sense to punish good people along with evil people. Earth is not Gomorrah, and the climate catastrophe will not selectively kill stupid people as God supposedly did by destroying Gomorrah.

  • he findings do not mean world leaders have already failed to honour their promises to stop the planet heating 1.5C

    Is that statement suppose to be a joke ? Or did someone get paid by the fossil fuel industry ? 1.5C has been exceeded, time to pray we do not exceed 2C in 5 years. To me, with how seriously our "leaders" are taking Climate Change, we will be very luckily to stay under 5C.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Torodung ( 31985 )

      Did you get to the part about "decadal?" Because I did. Because I have reading comprehension skills and an attention span. In the meantime, you started getting outraged before you finished the sentence, FFS.

  • If you moved to another continent, go "home" once a decade, not once a year. The luxury of easy, quick global travel is strictly an artifact of the last 75 years, and it needs to stop. If you own a vehicle, don't use it for trivial matters. No quick trips to the store to pick up one item. If all you need is milk for cereal, and it's not walking distance, you just don't get to have cereal. Of course those things alone won't get us anywhere close. But if we can't at least do that, can we do anything more sign

    • The greatest scam the polluters ever pulled was to remove the impetus for reducing emissions from where action can do the greatest good and where it belongs - on polluting industries and manufacturers - and convince people that instead it lies upon the end-user individual, who is told to sort their plastic based on its monomer constituents only to find out that all but one or two of them was always just being thrown in a dump anyway.

      A lot of progress has been made in packaging - cardboard is a lot better

      • I agree that the things I mention don't get us there - or even close. I'm just saying that if nobody is prepared to alter their own behaviour, we're doomed. And no, we're not really prepared to alter our behaviour. Not when it matters.

        To address the problem at source, you MUST deprive the downstream consumers. You can choke it off at consumption, or you can do it at production. Either way, the impact materializes at the front line. There is no magic wand that you can wave at the poliuters that corrects the

  • I hate these +1.5 celsius posts. They should make it simpler for regular people to understand: 1) Most Americans don't know what celsius is. Why don't they show this in Farenheit? 2) Most people think 1.5 Celsius is fairly small. They don't get that the average earth temperature is 15 Celsius. A +1.5 increase is +10% It's almost purposefully vague so the regular population won't freak out about it.

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