Editor-DN
Yes, we’re going to talk about another year of summer. Maybe you’re tired of the same old story: another year, another position in the top 10 hottest years, a podium we definitely don’t want to be standing on.
But the last two years have been different — and climate scientists don’t understand why.
We know that fossil fuels are primarily responsible for the Earth’s rising temperatures and our changing climate. But something else seems to be driving the temperature up, more than scientists expect or would like.
Last year was 1.48C warmer globally than the industrial average between 1850 and 1900. Breaking the 2020 record of 1.25C.According to the European Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Service.
The weather service said in its latest monthly bulletin that 2024 is “virtually certain” to be the warmest year on record. They also believe that this year 1.55 degrees Celsius. too hot
Through the Paris Agreement, nearly 200 jurisdictions want to limit their warming to below 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, with a target of 1.5 degrees Celsius, to significantly reduce the effects of climate change.
Although the limit appears to be breached, it will only be for one year, and the limit looks at long-term intensity, not just annual. And there’s a chance we could go back down in the coming years, even though global warming will continue to trend upward.
Meanwhile, the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) found in its latest monthly report. that January to October temperatures were the warmest in the 175-year record, 1.28C higher than the 1901-2000 average, and that “2024 is virtually certain to rank as the warmest year on record.” Will.”
This is not what was expected. NOAA’s annual climate report for 2023 predicted just one this year. 32.58 percent chance of warmest on record.
So, what happened?
Sure enough, we had an El Niño event, a natural, cyclical warming in a region of the Pacific Ocean that, combined with the atmosphere, can cause global temperatures to rise. He explained something about 2023. However, the warmth we typically see after an El Niño was expected to persist through the first few months of 2024.
“We are now 11 months into the 12 months since the peak of the El Niño event and global temperatures are still unusually high,” said Zeke Haasfader, a research scientist. Berkeley Eartha non-profit climate analysis organization.
There are factors that can cause some warming, such as the sun being at its peak in its 11-year cycle, which we are in right now. A reduction of polluted sulfur dioxide that would normally reflect the sun’s radiation. and the 2022 eruption of the Hanga Tonga–Hunga Ha’apai volcano in the South Pacific, which released a lot of water vapor into the atmosphere. But Haasfather said they usually add hundredths of a degree, and the time is not accurate.
Haasfather said some recent studies he’s read show that El Niño is acting differently than in the past, due to a “triple-dip” La Nina — the opposite of an El Niño — that our The pass was from 2020 to the end of 2022.
Ahira Sánchez-Lugo, a physical scientist at NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information, said the oceans are also playing a big role in the temperatures we see in 2023 and 2024.
He said that parts of the Atlantic Ocean, Indian Ocean, North Indian Ocean, Western Pacific Ocean were (record) warm in the first 10 months of the year.
And while he expected to see a jump in global temperatures, he said he didn’t expect to see it so soon.
‘disappointed’
Climate scientists are not God. They take the data they have, analyze it and come to a conclusion. But for these last two very unusual years, they’ve been struggling with what they’re seeing, and it’s hard for them to know what’s coming next.
“The frustration we had with not being able to do a better job of explaining (the heat) is becoming more intense,” said Gavin Schmidt, director of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies. “It’s been more disappointing than I expected.”
He said he and other scientists are holding a meeting in two weeks, where they can try to reach a consensus on why this is happening.
Scientists have warned that the end of this year could be 1.5C warmer than pre-industrial times, surpassing the current record of 1.48C last year. Some experts now fear that Donald Trump’s less friendly stance on climate change could worsen the crisis.
Clearly, climate scientists know that climate change is happening, and they have been very good at predicting global warming and its effects. But it’s the short term that they struggle with.
“We’re clearly in an era where people expect us to know more about what’s happening climatologically in relatively real time,” Schmidt said.
“And yet the community hasn’t really caught on to this new reality, and we haven’t put things in place that allow us to confidently say or confidently answer these questions.”
He and Hassfather wrote one Opinion piece about this for the New York Times Last week, in which he said climate scientists lacked methods to help explain “short-term phenomena … in real time,” which they desperately need.
When annual analyzes come out among climate agencies, the exact degree of warming may vary, Schmidt said, but the message is the same.
“If it’s accelerating, we need to redouble our efforts to reduce emissions. If it’s not accelerating, we need to redouble our efforts to reduce emissions.” Regardless of what the temperature is doing.”
