World Breaches 1.5C Global Warming Threshold for 12th Consecutive Month

The average temperature for June was 1.5C above the estimated average for that month for the pre-industrial reference period, and warmer globally than any previous June on record.

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A critical global warming threshold has been breached for an entire year, with June becoming the latest month to see average temperatures above 1.5C compared to pre-industrial times, the European Union’s weather service Copernicus has revealed.

The 1.5C threshold was set in 2015 as part of the Paris Agreement, which established a framework for limiting global warming to below 1.5C or “well below 2C” above pre-industrial levels by the end of the century. Breaching that threshold, scientists warn, could trigger multiple tipping points, with devastating and often irreversible consequences affecting the planet’s life-support systems that all societies depend on. Five tipping elements – including the collapse of the West Antarctic ice sheet and abrupt permafrost thaw – are already within reach and we may have already crossed the threshold.

While the latest data does not signal a permanent breach of the critical limit, which scientists say is measured over decades, it sends a clear warning to humanity that we are approaching the point of no return much faster than expected.

A recent exclusive survey conducted by the Guardian revealed that the 1.5C goal is increasingly out of reach, with nearly half of all lead authors and review editors of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reports since 2018 saying they believe humanity will breach the threshold. Of the 380 authors and editors interviewed by the Guardian, 132 (34.7%) expect global temperatures to rise by 2.5C this century, while 100 (26.3%) predict at least 3C of warming.

Among the scientists participating in the survey was Ruth Cerezo-Mota, an expert in climate modelling at the National Autonomous University of Mexico who said a 3C scenario is a “hopeful and conservative” estimate.

“There is not any clear sign from any government that we are actually going to stay under 1.5C,” she told the Guardian.

June was also the hottest in documented history, the thirteenth consecutive month to break a temperature record after May marked one year of uninterrupted record-breaking temperatures, according to Copernicus. Sea surface temperatures remained “unusually high” over many regions, averaging 20.85C, the highest value for June and the fifteenth month in a row to break a record.

“This is more than a statistical oddity and it highlights a large and continuing shift in our climate,” said Carlo Buontempo, Director of the Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S). 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.”

Buontempo described this scenario as “inevitable,” unless greenhouse gas emissions – the primary drivers of global warming – are drastically reduced.

The burning of coal, natural gas, and oil for electricity and heat is the single-largest source of global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, the primary drivers of global warming by trapping heat in the atmosphere and raising Earth’s surface temperature. Global fossil fuel consumption has more than doubled in the last 50 years, as countries around the world aim to improve their standards of living and economic output. In 2023, all three of the most potent GHGs – carbon dioxide (CO2), methane, and nitrous oxide – reached record highs.

The International Energy Agency (IEA) has urged countries to halt new gas and oil field projects, arguing that this is the only way to keep the 1.5C-compatible net-zero emissions scenario alive.

So far, the world has warmed by 1.2C compared to pre-industrial times, though IPCC data suggests that 20-40% of the global human population live in regions that, by the decade 2006–2015, had already experienced warming of more than 1.5C in at least one season. According to the UN body – which describes the Paris Agreement target as a “vital” necessity – every 0.5C (0.9F) of global warming will cause discernible increases in the frequency and severity of heat extremes, heavy rainfall events, and regional droughts.

Featured image: Copernicus Climate Change Service/ECMWF.